Nintendo and The Hardcore 2. I have to get my point across again!!!!!

    OK, so I previosly wrote a blog post on how Nintendo isn't abandoning the hardcore and stuff like that,  but I have to admit that former blog post kind of sucked. I got 15 comments off that though. For one thing I have to clear this up again so I encourage anyone who thinks that I am wrong to post a comment. I will make this shorter and sweeter.

    People are complaining about how a new Mario or Zelda being announced at 2008. For the first part ALL of you who were angry are very very very impatient. Mario Galaxy was finished in around October-early November of 2007!! Do you all really expect a trailer for a new Mario game to be released just 8 months later. And do you expect them to have all that stuff locked down yet!! It takes around 2 to 3 years to make a great worthwile game. I bet all of you expected a release date of Fall 2008. And I expected all of you to see a new game of every franchise all released in 2008. From the release of Wind Waker to the release of Twilight Princess, that is around 3 to 4 years. Twilight Princess was an amazing game on both GameCube or Wii. Now from late 2006 to mid-2008 was around 2 years. Considering how large most Zelda games are, 3/4 of the game wouldn't have been done by E3 2008. And they have to build a trailer. This opens up the possibility for a new take on the Zelda franchise (MMO or a much larger world) or several different projects. They aren't ready for these games. Personally I would like to say that the more games evolve, the more time it takes to build them. .

    An example of inconsistency among the gaming world is Final Fantasy XIII. That game has been in trailer form for 3-4 years. No one has complained. People are complaining than a new Mario game hasn't been released despite the fact that Galaxy was released in November 2007. 
    You all really expect Nintendo to release a new hit game every month.

    Now here is where I give the third-party developers the big middle finger. Third party developers like Ubisoft, Activision, and Data Design Interactive, DSI Games (the guys who made the M&M racing game) and several other developers are releasing crap games on Wii. They don't put time and effort into these games. The Wii is as powerful as an XBOX.  The Xbox games during 2005 looked REALLY good (COR: Escape from Butcher Bay) and were beautiful. Since graphics on a system get BETTER over time, imagine what games on the Xbox would of looked like in 2008. Now the Wii is basically the Xbox of this generation and the games should look better than COR did when it came out in 2004/2005. Unfortunently developers have been putting the system off as a PS2!! WTF!!! The Wii's controls are great for FPS games and should be correctly utilized. Does Free Radical, HVS, and Sega actually get it.

    The Wii has a hardcore audience. If you don't believe me, understand this. The Wii has sold around 30 million units worldwide. Super Smash Bros. Brawl sold around 7.47 million units as of December 2008. Mario Kart sold 9 million units. Resident Evil 4 sold 1 million units and Umbrella Chronicles also sold 1 million. Most games like Call of Duty or Medal of Honor don't sell as much because they are ports to other versions on the PS3, PS2, 360, or PSP. They don't fit on the Wii and usually have TERRIBLE graphics, despite the power of the Wii. Based on the reception for The Conduit, the amount of Nintendo Wi-Fi Connected users on Wii, the Wii has a very large hardcore install base. The third party developers should put some effort into those games. Especially 2K Games.

    The Wii has a hardcore audience. The games are being developed right now, but are not ready for human eyes to see just yet. There I said it. Live with it, sleep with it, eat with it, until you two meet eye to eye.

[Jinxstar]

"From the release of Wind Waker to the release of Twilight Princess, that is around 3 to 4 years." Yes you are right but the team was also working on "The four swords" and "the minish cap" in between those projects. It's not like they stopped wind waker then jumper to Twilight right away. And further more Miyamoto halted production on Twilight princess mid stream because Nintendo told him about the Wii and asked if he wanted to hold off so they could have a killer app day 1. he obliged but also released it on GC.

I am a huge Zelda fan and have played every zelda game minus seasons and ages.

"The Wii's controls are great for FPS games and should be correctly utilized." If you feel like buying 300$'s worth of periferals then it is. a second controller for your friend with nunchuck, 2 motion plus add ons, Wii speak... All add's to way too much for me and I have still to see a game using an FPS style of gameplay I would take over a console or PC... House of the dead overkill looks good but thats not a ninty game... Just on the system...

I agree that many people unfairly expect a new SM game within a year but thats just people...

However you talk of hardcore audience. I feel i am pretty hardcore. I have 30 games on the PS3 currently about 8 that I play on PC and 0 that I play on my wii anymore. I unlocked everyone in SSBB. It is fun in small doses once every few months. I never even unlocked all the levels in Mario Kart beacuse it was cheap... Very cheap. If you could turn off the handicap I would have loved the game but honestly I feel you should be able to recover from any game mechanic... i.e. Your on rainbow road and you get hit by a turtle shell. There is no way you can avoid falling off the edge and losing 1st place. The little cloud guy carries you back and as soon as you hit the gass someone runs into you and you get hit by another shell and went from 1st to last without a chance to recover in any way... That to me is not fun... I like a game that requires skill not chance... Chance to me is a crutch. Mario Kart is one big Crutch to me and is not designed for the "Hardcore" if it was then the person in 1st should have just as much of a chance to get a lightning bolt as the person in last and should not move slower because they are in first... To me it feels like the dev's used these handicaps as a way of getting around making quality AI and only made this game to sell to the masses... Which it did... Basically to me skill is whats fun. not chance or handicaps...

Do Nintendo cater to the Hardcore... No. They cater to making a profit. That is 100% acceptable and you don't have to defend it. Are there Hardcore games on the Wii... Sure. The games I own are as follows. SM Galaxy, SSBB, Metal Slug Anthology, Boom Blox, Twilight Princess... My old GC games and a few VC games like old zelda stuff... I have preordered MadWorld and Overkill.... Otherwise SimAnimals and junk like that flood the system. Shovelware everywhere and people eat it up. Why would Nintendo or anyone else care anymore... They are rolling in money... I feel a new Zelda will be announced this year but I expect it to be less Hardcore then the last honestly...

To each his own though bro. Game on.

[SinnedNogara]

I must disagree. I believe that there are several different teams working on each Zelda games. Minish Cap and The Four Swords were worked on by different teams (how else is TP so good?). 2008 was kind of a letdown, but 2009 will be a GREAT year for the Wii with The Conduit, Sin & Punishment 2, and MadWorld. The download selection is also good, but I feel that the N64 library could use a lot of work. The Wii is hardcore, just play No More Heroes (I LUV NO MORE HEROES).

Here is a question. Why do games like Sin & Punishment on the Virtual Console take up 287 blocks, while games like Resident Evil 4 take up 1 block. WTF is up with that. Anyone who reads this comment can leave a comment telling me so. Otherwise I would have downloaded like 30 games right now.

[Jinxstar]

The thing is your confusing nintendo with other dev's as far as being hardcore. Wii music is not hardcore, MadWorld is... Nintendo vs Sega... just like the old days =D Is the Wii hardcore? No but it has Hardcore games... Nintendo didn't design it with slicing heads off with stop signs in their sites. They designed it for Wii fit and Wii Music...

Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka were the 2 founding dev's for the Zelda Series mainly the latter. They have worked on every single project and have picked their teams... All at Nintendo's Studios... is it always the same folks? No. but many are...Four Swords and minish Cap were good but probably didn't need as big a team as TP... Also they were probably working on it all at the same time....

In Issue 37 of the British Official Nintendo Magazine, released 21 November 2008, it is stated that "the teams [are] still in the planning stages" and that "we wouldn't expect to see or hear anything more until the E3 event next summer at the earliest" and that "even that may be optimistic". However, the magazine says that "we WILL know something in 2009 [about the title]"

I know my Zelda and we will have something here in the next years or 2. Also keep in mind Phantom hourglass has come out after TP...

[Tony P]

"An example of inconsistency among the gaming world is Final Fantasy XIII. That game has been in trailer form for 3-4 years. No one has complained."

That is HIGHLY inaccurate. I invite you to look anywhere on the internet for the ubiquitous proof.

[TriforceLightning]

The Wii caters to all its the so called fans of other consoles that complain of it not being hardcore.It plays all types of games and has more multi-million sellers than any other console besides the DS.I think PS3/360 fanboys are scared of the change that the Wii has brought to the industry.

[jtucker78]

You're totally right. Most gamers are scared of the changes the Wii has brought.

They are scared that there will be no graphical and technological leap next generation because Nintendo has shown the competition that you can release a console with negligible advancement from the previous generation with a gimick and clever advertising and make loads of money.

And we've also learned that cheap low production value party titles out sell the high production value games built by passionate developers.

Scary times indeed.
Good job there are still passionate developers out there (like High Voltage) that aren't selling out by building cheap low quality titles to make money.

[jtucker78]

Fair blog mate.

I'm one of those guys that occasionally gives Nintendo grief.
The reason I do it is because I bought a Wii and realised it wasn't the console I wanted it to be.
I thought it would be like the Gamecube (i.e. comparable hardware to the other consoles)
My fault really. I should have waited to see how it turned out before I pre-ordered for release day.

I really enjoy high production value games with great graphics so the Wii was always going to disappoint. I was hoping that motion would make up for it, but for me it doesn't. Just my opinion. Those that love it - great.
Motion is still in it's infancy. The wiimote is a first generation motion controller and it doesn't work as many expected. No big deal. It was a new direction for Nintendo. I respect them for trying. And they've still got the sales based on the idea of motion controls. Unfortunately the Wiimote is pretty much only capable of waggle and it stuggles with direction and mapping proper motions. Even Nintendo can't get it to work in Wii Sports or Zelda TP. Waggle = swipe tennis raquet or waggle = swipe sword.
Maybe the second generation (Motion Plus) will sort it out and Sports Resort looks like it works much better.

I'll give credit where credit is due thought. IR works really well. The IR in Metroid worked excellently and so did the new controls in RE4. I'd love to try out IR aiming on a big budget FPS.
But motion ... rudimentary at best.

Nintendo has games. I won't deny it. It just doesn't have all the types of games I enjoy these days.
I like great graphics
5.1 Dolby Digital (v important to me.)
A hastle free and quick online
Voice chat implemented on all online games
Easy to set up matches.
And Survival Horror is my thing.

At the end of the day Nintendo is an adequate little console if it is your thing.
My favourite 2 game series without a doubt are Mario and Zelda which were what has kept me coming back to Nintendo again and again from NES to SNES to N64 to Cube.
N64 and Cube graphics were awesome for their time.

I will certainly be borrowing my brother's Wii / buying one back off ebay to play the next Zeldas and Full Mario titles.
In the meantime the other two consoles provide the game experiences I'm after.

It's all personal preference really.
I respect you for persevering with Nintendo.

Wii wasn't what I wanted in a console. Like I say it's my fault.
I shouldn't hate on Nintendo. If I should be angry at anyone it should be at myself for not doing my homework before I make a purchase.

[Cajun Chicken]

They have Kirby and Starfox as franchises, I hope they really do that this year, because at the moment the unfortunate shovelware being made for the Wii is keeping me away from buying the Wii primarily for Super Mario Galaxy and Super Smash Bros Brawl.
That and the price, for the majority of the games it plays, I'm not really willing to pay that much for the system.

Kirby and Starfox will change my mind immediatly.

[SpoonyRedMage]

I agree with you, the Wii does have a good selection of excellent, challenging titles that seem to be ignored and then people complain about a lack of the titles.

I recently did a blog about why so many "hardcore" gamers hate the Wii, and I'm what the etiquette is about self-promotion here but I think it is worth a read.(damn that is shameless self-promotion.)

Mario Kart has always had handicaps because it makes it possible for someone in fourth place to actually catch up to the first place if they're good enough, it does make it more fair and I like that because in modern gaming(particularily online), so called N00bs never get a chance to improve because they get massacred by experienced players.