Topic: Game Journalism

[Deguello]

EA didn't market it and Nintendo didn't give two craps about it

If EA didn't care enough to market it, showing a lack of faith in their own product, why should Nintendo care for them?  EA took care of Tiger Woods 10 by themselves, what was wrong with Dead Space Extraction?

Third parties are actively supporting the console,

Yeah, we've noticed.  They just aren't supporting with much worthwhile, and every piece of crappy shovelware just hurts their ability to sell anything more with every title.  If they had made better games in the beginning, they wouldn't be in this mess.

[NWR_Lindy]

I think it's ridiculous that Wii games are priced at $50.  They should all be $30 to start (since they cost sooooooooooooooooooooooo much less to create than HD games, RIGHT?).  Heck, by the time I buy them they're usually $13.99, so that $40-$50 price point gets them nowhere.

[Halbred]

Heck, I doubt the developer determines price point. EA probably slapped the $50 price tag on DSE and then forgot to market it. I feel sorry for Visceral.

[NWR_Neal]

Especially when you hear what's happening to Visceral. Supposedly Dante's Inferno is a different team with the name slapped on it. They're basically EA's bitch now.

Though this could all be hearsay.

[Peachylala]

Who ISN'T EA's bitch in this generation?

[BlackNMild2k1]

:starts raising hand....remembers DSE.... slowly puts it back down again:

[UncleBob]

I see a lot of blame being thrown Nintendo's way - that Nintendo should hold the hands of 3rd Party Developers, refuse to license bad games, pay for advertising, etc., etc...

Does Sony and Microsoft do this?  I'm pretty sure they both have a hand in advertising at least, but what about the other two?

[BlackNMild2k1]

MS bank rolls development for timed exclusives
which leads to.....
Sony forcing extras in every game that is a port from another system.

[Stogi]

I always see commercials for games on the PS360 that have a review in them. I haven't once seen that for the Wii. If your game took real effort, thrid party, and is critically acclaimed...advertise it, maybe?

[Deguello]

Overall, this thread is a success.  Nobody can really argue any defense for the third parties that doesn't involve shifting the blame to Nintendo.  And we have two new conspiracy theories to add to the mix.

One involves a dastardly plot by Nintendo to make an extremely popular console, corral all the third parties onto the Wii, tell them to make horrible games to boost Nintendo's brand image and make their games look very attractive to new customers, sap the effort and develop budgets of the hard-working third parties, and then Nintendo just sits back, relaxes, and rakes in all the profits from their effortless and easy projects. Of course, why third parties would just accept Nintendo's conniving and scheming plot at face value and go along with it for three years is rather suspect, but it makes perfect sense otherwise.

The other is that Nintendo is such a controlling tyrant that they forced third parties to make shovelware for the Wii by not telling them not to make shovelware.  It is such an outrage that Nintendo could possibly attempt to meddle in third parties affairs by not meddling.  And then they have the gall to demand that third parties should make whatever they please.  Who elected you comptroller of game content, Nintendo?!  Maybe next time you'll think about not encumbering third parties in any way.  Autocrat!  Dictator!

[Peachylala]

I always see commercials for games on the PS360 that have a review in them. I haven't once seen that for the Wii. If your game took real effort, thrid party, and is critically acclaimed...advertise it, maybe?

Let's be fair, do said games really deserve those good scores?
 
DO THEY?

[Stogi]

I would say some of the games do deserve that score. We're talking about Wii games right?

[Peachylala]

I would say some of the games do deserve that score. We're talking about Wii games right?

It's pretty much a common conception that Wii game reviewers, besides us and NWR, are incapable of reviewing Wii games properly. (see IGN's NSMBWii review, the failure is astonding)
 
I bet Daemon could troll SMB3 if he wanted to. It's on the VC, so technically it's a Wii game.
 
=(
 
 

[Urkel]

And we have two new conspiracy theories to add to the mix.

Nothing new here. RickPowers stated the exact same theories when he last posted here.
 
Makes perfect sense too. Just look at the DS, which DOES have meaningful third party support. Nintendo is really struggling to sell their games with all that competition.

[TJ Spyke]

Who ISN'T EA's bitch in this generation?

EA has been tanking in the last 2 years. If anything, they are other peoples bitch now.

[EasyCure]

If this community was really thirsting for a AAA 3rd party Wii game, then they'd be too busy playing Silent Hill to get this thread to 11 pages in the course of 10 days. 

To be fair, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories could be played in one of those 11 days, leaving plenty of time for posting. In fact as we speak I paused NMH: DS for a second to post this, but only after I read the next two pages of this thread (which comes after my next round of Pizza with a Vengance!)

Fake Edit: Pro beat me to this point 1 page ago, whoops!

Everybody on this thread needs to go out and get Tatsunoko VS. Capcom, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, and pick up Monster Hunter Tri when it comes out.

TvC: Will be picking up after I finish NMH2 (poor Metroid Prime Trilogy got lost in my back-log)
Silent Hill: Already purchased, for someone else. Thinking about getting my own copy instead of borrowing the one I purchased for the person that has a smaller wii library than I.
Monster Hunter Tri: looks interesting, and the CC Pro bundle looks very enticing.

Point is: Informed gamers do their part when it comes to quality games (and even some of questionable quality..) and still have time to post on these boards to express their opinions about being talked down to by someone that essentially works for me, because I'm the one spending my money on their products so they can profit from it. So, I've clearly down my part right? Well what about the 3rd parties? It isn't enough to just put some effort to make a game and throw it out there and hope that I wasn't playing the leatest and greatest Wii game to know their next game had released, they still have to try to advertise it. Yes, even to me, a "non-casual/hardcore" and relatively informed gamer. Someone go into the DSE thread and tell me how many times I'd posted "wait, this games out already!?" because I honestly had no idea. If i go to a retailers video game section, I usually know what I want so I only spend a few minutes rummaging thru the crap to get to what I want..

What about the rest of the userbase? What about the non traditional gamer who isn't very informed of the latest games? They're not only unaware that a lot of shelf space is taken up by crap, but they're COMPLETELY unaware of any games with actual merit.

Anectdote time:

Mom goes into Target, wants to buy a new Wii game for the family to play, she really enjoys WiiSports so she gets a game that looks similar, takes it home and it isn't as fun and probably very buggy/glitchy. Months later same mom goes into that same Target and decides to get a fitness game to suppliment her WiiFit work-outs, buys the closest ripoff available, takes it home and has the same regret as last time. Well, fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice...

Get it? 3rd parties aren't only NOT marketing their good games but releasing so much filler that it hides the decent/good games from buyers view. That my friends brings us back to the point of this thread, which Pro was able to demonstrate visually without us having to be blinded by the bright lights of Wal*mart.

god i'm sick of long post

[Deguello]

It doesn't even have to be a Mom, really.  It can be gamer labeled "casual" or even a regular everyday gamer who doesn't hit refresh on IGN every 30 seconds.  Even the people who ran the fiercest defense for the third parties here still admit Nintendo has out-developed them out-marketed them.  That's the kind of word-of-mouth that spreads into "Third parties make mostly garbage, buy Nintendo only" that no amount of marketing boost from Nintendo could help against that, especially since it has the added benefit of being true.

[Chozo Ghost]

One thing that might help is if Nintendo allowed more of its franchise characters to cross over into 3rd party games, even if its only cameo appearances. We all know that Mario & Sonic at the Olympics was a huge seller, even though it was (kinda) a third party effort. One of the best things Nintendo has going for it is the strong catalog of beloved characters from its games. Mario is the main one, but there's also Link, Samus, etc.

Nintendo should open up these characters a bit more and loan them out to 3rd parties, or just let them appear or be referenced in 3rd party games. Doing that would perk up people's interest and they would want to check it out.

But of course, if Nintendo did this they would also have to be very careful the only pimp out their characters to quality 3rd party efforts. Having these beloved characters appear in garbage games would dilute them and make them lose their value by being associated with such filth. That's why it would also be important to have Nintendo Superstars like Miyamoto and so forth supervising these efforts and make sure the games are worthy, and if they aren't worthy then Nintendo should pull its support from it immediately.

[Deguello]

I think Nintendo already tried that last generation, Chozo.  They let Little Mac in Fight Night Round something and put Mario in some EA sports titles.  It didn't pan out very well and didn't really help much.

[Mop it up]

Plus I think that would result in overexposure to Nintendo's franchises, which could cause them to become stale and uninteresting. Just look at how many Mario games were released for the GameCube, especially during the last two years. Even I think it was a little excessive, and I'm a huge fan of Mario.

[Stratos]

Don't forget Link in Soul Calibur, which rocketed the series into the attention of Nintendo fans and then they ditched the system when a lot of Nintendo fans fell in love with the game through Links appearance.

Also, AV/Sega with F-Zero and Namco with Mario Kart GP and Star Fox Assault were also part of some deals that occurred last gen.

I think there were some more too.

[KDR_11k]

I don't think loaning characters out like that is going to help against the Wall of Shame. Most of these new gamers aren't looking for Nintendo characters, they probably don't even know half of 'em. Maybe they had a NES and loved Super Mario Bros but that's it. I don't think they'll even care if you present them with a Zelda game. It's not even just about quality but also appeal to new gamers, you can make the most polished OOT sequel and these people won't care because they don't want to play complicated 3D games (I tried it, they get confused by 3D navigation).

[UncleBob]

I keep seeing people bring up Silent Hill - isn't it just a remake of a PS2 title that's also being ported to the PS2 and PSP?

Man, that sounds like an awesome game I want to get in on.

Not to mention the awesome reviews it's getting.  "Tedious Bull****" and "one-time rental" don't really get me excited.

[KDR_11k]

The original was a PS1 title actually.

[NWR_DrewMG]

I keep seeing people bring up Silent Hill - isn't it just a remake of a PS2 title that's also being ported to the PS2 and PSP?

Man, that sounds like an awesome game I want to get in on.

Not to mention the awesome reviews it's getting.  "Tedious Bull****" and "one-time rental" don't really get me excited.

You must not have read my review.   It's not a remake, it's a retelling of the premise, with a completely different plot.  The similarities are few and far between.

No, this is an original Wii title being ported to PS2 and PSP.  And if you're going to cherry pick review lines as a reason not to buy it, well then I can use the same tactic:

"Silent Hill: Shattered Memories fills a gap in the Wii's horror lineup, and it does so with finesse and substance."

"The way the flashlight illuminates the environment really impresses"

"The game features five different endings depending on your responses to these questions, giving you plenty of incentive to replay the game."

Anyways, didn't mean to derail this thread with talk about video games.