Topic: If Nintendo are struggling to find games to publish on the Wii this year...

[broodwars]

Maybe this was posted somewhere else not sure.
 
Nintendo says fantastic games are on the way this year.
 

I guess we haven't made any announcements recently because we've been concentrating on the 3DS launch, but there are still lots of games to come. I'm sure you'll see at this year's E3. For anybody who has a Wii, they can rest assured that we'll be bringing some fantastic new experiences to them."
[quote/]
 
Full article
http://www.n-europe.com/news.php?nid=15229
 
If anything we will only be enjoying our Wii's from June on up. Good thing I am a Pokeholic...

Considering at one time Reggie stated that he thought Wii Music and Animal Crossing: City Folk were "fantastic new experiences" for the Christmas Season, this does not exactly fill me with hope.  Hopefully, he'll provide such experiences, given that my Wii has basically now become my Virtual Console/WiiWare machine from lack of use.

[BlackNMild2k1]

My Wii has blended into the black entertainment system it sits inside of.

I only just remembered it was there when the blue light started to glow a few weeks ago.

[Luigi Dude]

Considering at one time Reggie stated that he thought Wii Music and Animal Crossing: City Folk were "fantastic new experiences" for the Christmas Season, this does not exactly fill me with hope.  Hopefully, he'll provide such experiences, given that my Wii has basically now become my Virtual Console/WiiWare machine from lack of use.

Reggie has to say every game NOA releases is fantastic or else he'll be fired.  The only time he's allowed to be truthful is if the game isn't going to be released in America like Disaster where he outright trashed the game.

[broodwars]

Considering at one time Reggie stated that he thought Wii Music and Animal Crossing: City Folk were "fantastic new experiences" for the Christmas Season, this does not exactly fill me with hope.  Hopefully, he'll provide such experiences, given that my Wii has basically now become my Virtual Console/WiiWare machine from lack of use.

Reggie has to say every game NOA releases is fantastic or else he'll be fired.

I believe you just made my point.

[Ian Sane]

Considering at one time Reggie stated that he thought Wii Music and Animal Crossing: City Folk were "fantastic new experiences" for the Christmas Season, this does not exactly fill me with hope.

I remember when Reggie first debuted everyone was all into the "kicking ass and taking names" stuff.  What the probably missed is that he said the DS launch title that most impressed him was some bullshit Spider-Man game that no one remembers.  It did not take long for me to regard him as a mere shill.
 
But then NOA has never been able to promise much.  Since most of the Nintendo's games come from Japan if NCL ain't making them NOA just has nothing to offer.  NOA can't make promises so their promises mean squat.

[Luigi Dude]

Well NOA did help get us the new Punch-Out for the Wii.

http://us.wii.com/iwata_asks/punchout/vol1_page5.jsp

Tanabe:  After we finished Mario Strikers Charged, we discussed what we would do next. I had heard that they wanted to make a new version of one of Nintendo's properties, and since Punch-Out!! has been consistently popular in America, they said that they would really like to make a new version.

Miyamoto:  NOA has been asking for a new version of Punch-Out!! for a long time as well.

So NOA can be of some use in helping to inform NCL on what's popular in America.  Of course since Miyamoto said NOA had been asking for a new Punch-Out for a long time, it shows they have to be really devoted in order to get it NCL to eventually listen.

It makes me wonder if there's any other games NOA might want that NCL is still taking their time to decide.

[Ceric]

Epic Mickey was a gift for Christmas.  I played it for about a week pretty solid but, got side tracked and never finished it.  The last time I played my Wii before that was ... when Super Mario Galaxy 2 came out.  I stuck through that almost to the end but I have a severe hate of Bowser Jr. because he's annoying and the Koopa Kids are much better characters.
 
My PS3 gets use everyday of the week pretty much since I've bought it because of everything it does.  Nothing Wii wise I just had to have last year.
 
Now for full disclosure I did buy a 3DS at launch with Super Monkey Ball and SSF4 3D Edition.  I have to say I am thoroughly enjoying it.

[Chozo Ghost]

What should happen is NOA should be seriously beefed up and given the autonomy it needs to put out its own titles. That's what should happen. Not only would that alleviate the games shortage, but it would also pump out games which are tailor made with the North American market in mind. Some of those games could of course then be exported to Japan, Europe, and other markets. It would be a win-win situation for everyone.

[bustin98]

@Ceric! I see you on your PS3 almost every day, too. I haven't really played on the Wii since Goldeneye. Though I plan on picking up Conduit 2. Right now the kids use it in their playroom for Netflix.

I agree that NOA should be on their own to better deal with this market. They seemed more interested in selling the Wii as an accessory to Wii Sports rather than a gaming machine capable of so much more. The people who bought the Wii for Wii Sports weren't interested in much beyond that experience, and those that are interested in a much more rounded experience do not appreciate the hand holding route that Nintendo takes. I believe the Japanese influence is mostly responsible for this, though there is probably still some corporate culture lingering from Howard Lincoln's days. It probably kills some old dude there each time they ok a game with red blood and curse words.

[Ceric]

Hey Bustin,
 
I totally forgot about Goldeneye... That might be worth picking up if its cheap now.

[Ian Sane]

What should happen is NOA should be seriously beefed up and given the autonomy it needs to put out its own titles.

Sounds good in theory.  The only concern is the quality.  Nintendo maintains a pretty high standard of quality.  Can NOA be trusted to maintain that without direction from NCL?  I'll admit I've got a pretty strong bias towards Japanese game development.  Would we get more Metroid Prime or more Geist?

[Luigi Dude]

Can NOA be trusted to maintain that without direction from NCL?  I'll admit I've got a pretty strong bias towards Japanese game development.  Would we get more Metroid Prime or more Geist?

Yeah, that's the problem with giving NOA more power and leaving them alone.  Since all of Nintendo's top game designers are in Japan, there's no guarantee NOA would be able to function right without them.

I mean just look at all the studio's that made good games when NCL designers help give them direction, vs what they make when they're left to do things alone.  Factor 5, Silicon Knight, Rare and Next Level Games.  All of these studio's made great games when they worked for Nintendo but without Nintendo they're hopless.  Actually we should at Retro to the list since the studio was a complete mess until Miyamoto laid down the law which helped shape them to what they are today.

So yeah, NCL's total control over things can be a blessing and curse.  On the one hand, NCL a lot of times is responsible for a lack of creativity that some of these studio's might have wanted.  But on the other, NCL's control is what caused these studio's to be able to make great games in the first place.  So if NOA was to be allowed to be it's own seperate entity, we might end up getting new IP games that appeal more to the American audience, but at the same time the quality of these games won't be anywhere close to the quality of games NCL is involved with since they'd lack the huge talent that NCL currently helps supply.

[UncleBob]

Just my two cents, but what NoA needs is to be given a chance to sprout their own wings, but still be able to call on NCL when needed.

Why can't NoA spear-head more development projects and spin them off to various parts of NCL for further development and play testing?

[BlackNMild2k1]

I'm sure NCL already got tired of turning down their crap and wasting Miyamoto's time trying to rework it into something usable by his standards. Maybe they ned to take more of their experienced In-House Devs that have trained under their lord and master and start branching them out to their own studios so that they can farm their own teams.

Send a few of them out to the States and a few more out to Europe. They can't rely on Miyamoto forever, so they need to start testing the waters with new talent sooner rather than later.

[Luigi Dude]

I'm sure NCL already got tired of turning down their crap and wasting Miyamoto's time trying to rework it into something usable by his standards. Maybe they ned to take more of their experienced In-House Devs that have trained under their lord and master and start branching them out to their own studios so that they can farm their own teams.

Send a few of them out to the States and a few more out to Europe. They can't rely on Miyamoto forever, so they need to start testing the waters with new talent sooner rather than later.

Actually Nintendo has been doing this for a while now.  Kensuke Tanabe has been in charge of overlooking all of Nintendo's Western made games for almost a decade now.  The last Western game Miyamoto really overlooked was the original Metroid Prime.  After that Tanabe was basically made the man in charge of all non-Japanese Nintendo developed games.

[BlackNMild2k1]

and how many games is that? I think that man needs help, maybe either a US or EURO counterpart so he doesn't have to spread himself thin. We need more non-JPN developed games just so we have some variety and a steady stream of content since 3rd parties aren't that interested in bringing everything they got to fill the void.

[Luigi Dude]

and how many games is that?

Metroid Prime 2: Echoes
Geist
Battalion Wars
Mario Strikers
Metroid Prime Hunters
Metroid Prime Pinball
Mario vs Donkey Kong 2: March of the Mini's
Excite Truck
Mario Strikers Charged
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption
Battalion Wars 2
Excitebots: Trick Racing
Punch-Out!!
Mario vs Donkey Kong: Minis March Again
Mario vs Donkey Kong: Mini-Land Mayhem
Donkey Kong Country Returns
Pilotwings Resort

[BlueStorm]

What people fail to realize is that Nintendo employs only 4600 employees.  This is far too few to actively support both the Wii and DS with the amount of software people want (and ramp up for unannounced platforms) etc.

Blizzard employs a similar number of people and manages to put what 1-2 titles a year?

It certainly doesn't help that NCL is so Japan centric, and NOA pretty much has to smile and wave (and laugh) at what they say.

This end of cycle lack of games sure gets old.  It happens because nintendo just can't produce more content and work on new platforms at the same time.