Topic: Nintendo Teabagged Once Again....

[BlackNMild2k1]

Epic unveils Unreal Engine 3 for iPhone.

I got together with Mark Rein last week and he showed me an Unreal Engine 3 tech demo running on a 3rd generation iPod Touch. The same Unreal Engine 3 that powers Gears of War 2, running on an iPod Touch. The engine also works on the iPhone 3GS, and Mark tells me that we’ll see it on another mobile platform at CES (hmm...).

PC, Xbox360, PS3..... ummmm iPhone
WTF is going on here?

[Urkel]

The "Game Industry". That's what's going on.

[ShyGuy]

Are they stupid or are they liars?

[Urkel]

A little from column A, a little from column B.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

A little from column A, a little from column B.

This industry is quite the multilayered cake of stupid.

[broodwars]

PC, Xbox360, PS3..... ummmm iPhone
WTF is going on here?

Well, if you believe Telltale Games, the iPhone and its ilk are more powerful than the Wii.  Perhaps the Wii just doesn't have the horsepower to handle the engine?  Barring that, perhaps they're just not wasting their time trying to implement it on Wii because they know that no game that actually uses it will sell on Wii.

[TJ Spyke]

Apparently the iPhone/iPod Touch are more powerful than Xbox 360 too because I have seen lots of people say that games from Telltale Games have the same framerate problems with the Xbox Live Arcade versions, Telltale Games just seems to be incompetent at developing console games.

[Deguello]

PC, Xbox360, PS3..... ummmm iPhone
WTF is going on here?

Well, if you believe Telltale Games, the iPhone and its ilk are more powerful than the Wii.  Perhaps the Wii just doesn't have the horsepower to handle the engine?  Barring that, perhaps they're just not wasting their time trying to implement it on Wii because they know that no game that actually uses it will sell on Wii.

Well then why put it on the iPhone, then?  I can't even think of a single game that did WELL on the iphone at all, much less anything that would use Unreal 3 Engine.

[Chozo Ghost]

If this is true it is a bunch of bullcrap.

[TJ Spyke]

Depends on your definition of "well" (and how much they cost to make). For example, Pangea said that (as of January 2009) they had sold 810,000 copies of their game "Enigmo". Some other publishers have also reported their numbers:

iShoot (which cost $1.99) has sold at least 550,000 copies
Flick Fishing has sold over 1 million copies
Flight Control has sold over 1.5 million copies
Crash Bandicoot has likely sold at least 1 million (as it is near the top of Apple's list of all-time best selling paid iPhone games)

So while a lot of games may bomb or barely make even (I have seen developers report spending something like $32,000 on a game and then only selling a few hundred dollars worth of copies), there are some games that do really well for a cell phone game. Even games that may not sell a ton of copies may make enough profit for companies to survive on their iPhone/iPod Touch game and apps sales.

[ShyGuy]

Unless Epic is giving away their engine, the UE3 iPhones are going to cost more than $32,000 to make.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Basically, if they can take the time to make a UE3 for iPhone, then they can take the time to make it for the best selling console of the generation.

But lets not forget what Mark Rein has said in the past.

"Ummmmm, well, this is kinda a high definition engine. Designed for a certain level of graphics card and certain amount of CPU. You know, I'm sure one of our licensees will squeeze it down into the Wii. The way Ubisoft squeezed Unreal Engine 2 into the PSP," he explained in a little bit more detail exactly why the Wii and Unreal Engine 3 won't become best buddies, "Unreal Engine 3 is designed for a high level shader architecture and the Wii doesn't have that. I mean, you know, it's just not what we've been aiming for, so it's not something we're looking to do or support."

source: http://www.joystiq.com/2007/03/08/mark-rein-says-no-unreal-engine-3-for-wii/

So it's not like I expected him make it for the Wii, but to send time to make it for the iPhone instead?

[MegaByte]

Should we call this an...

EPIC FAILURE?

[Ian Sane]

Some day in the future are we going to discover some sort of clause in Nintendo's Wii third party contract that is so damaging to the third party that they would not only not support the Wii but specifically try to make Nintendo fail?  And I assume this does not affect the portable business for some reason.

It sounds so insane but it really does seem like there is some plot in the videogame industry to specifically sabotage any attempt by Nintendo to succeed in the console market.  I'm not looking at the media here because I think the Wii is deserving of criticism.  But with developers it makes so little sense.  The Wii is capable of having decent games.  Maybe not ones with cutting edge graphics but GOOD games are clearly possible and they'll even still look good just not AS good as the competition.  With the Wii being the clear market leader there is no reason to not make something worthwhile for it and as games like NSMB Wii demonstrate the userbase does buy GOOD games.  They're not hardwired to only like ****.

Was Nintendo really so horrible when they were on top with the NES and SNES that every other videogame company wants to do whatever they can from preventing them from having that sort of power again?  And why does this not apply to the portable market?  Why is Nintendo is beloved by third parties in that realm?  Because the Gameboy/DS line was such a huge success?  Uh... so is the Wii.

I always doubted the idea because it seems like such stupid business and I can't imagine EVERY company being so inept at running a business.  But it's just gotten to the point that I can't come up with a decent explanation.

[KDR_11k]

Malstrom's theory was that it was about disruption, that the Wii no longer allows third parties to leverage their size and make beautiful and expensive games that no small company could hope to match, on the Wii any startup can go almost toe to toe with a multinational megacorp because creativity does not require gigantic budgets. On the HD systems the established megacorps can easily lock newcomers out by creating a standard of tech that's so high you can't match it with a startup budget but on the Wii graphics aren't such a deciding factor.

[BlackNMild2k1]

So 3rd parties are trying to disrupt Nintendo's business practices by actively sabotaging their own efforts, not participating at all or only contributing to the competition?

If one day such a thing can actually be proven to be happening, then I hope that all guilty parties do suffer the fate of all the unfortunate companies of the generation for purposely leaving potential money on the table.
I don't actually wish that on them since it's the little people that don't make the decisions that suffer first and the most, but something really needs to change.

[MegaByte]

It might not be as active as sabotage; they could still be under the mindset that Nintendo's developments are just fads.  Or they have a certain vision that doesn't line up with Nintendo's.  Or it could be something to do with the licensing.  Or, it could be the tools.  Sure, you can make good games, but if you have to put in a disproportionate amount of development effort to make it work on the Wii due to poor support development from Nintendo, then the perception might be that it's not worth the trouble.  I've tried questioning devs to figure out what's going on here, but they suddenly become reluctant to give specifics or say anything negative about Nintendo.

[Ian Sane]

Or, it could be the tools.  Sure, you can make good games, but if you have to put in a disproportionate amount of development effort to make it work on the Wii due to poor support development from Nintendo, then the perception might be that it's not worth the trouble.

That's not a bad theory.  I work as a programmer.  If Nintendo is super lousy at providing support then that could effectively make it financially impossible to make a good Wii game.  You could hit a roadblock, invest time and effort in trying to work around it and not come up with a solution, all while Nintendo ignores you.  You may just outright be STUCK and then have to decide whether to spend more money trying to solve something you have no guarantee of actually solving or just saying "**** it" and focus on the consoles where you already know what you're doing.
 
Didn't Nintendo hide the existence of some microcode on the N64 to give themselves and Rare an advantage?  Wouldn't it be SO typical of Nintendo to leave out of their documentation some important details about how the remote works so that their games look that much more superior?  And if you were a videogame developer and you knew Nintendo was doing this, why wouldn't you not want to support them?
 
As for not giving the specifics in interviews?  Well would it not be slander to suggest such a thing with no real proof (and you could never truly prove it, just suspect it)?  Plus if you are still making Wii games, just not very good ones, and make money from it then you wouldn't want to burn your bridge either.
 

 Malstrom's theory was that it was about disruption, that the Wii no longer allows third parties to leverage their size and make beautiful and expensive games that no small company could hope to match, on the Wii any startup can go almost toe to toe with a multinational megacorp because creativity does not require gigantic budgets.

A lot of these offending third parties have the talent to make better games than these upstarts.  The DS allows for more equal footing as well and yet big guns like Konami and Square are kings on the DS because they have the talent and make some of the best games on the system.  If Capcom can make Resident Evil 4 on the Gamecube then surely on the more-powerful Wii they could make a new Resident Evil (that isn't an on-rails shooter) that could squash any small team WiiWare game flat.  These companies don't just rely on pretty graphics.  They've got some real talent and I'm pretty sure they know it.
 
Besides the other consoles provide an outlet for low budget devs as well.  All three consoles have a WiiWare equivalent.  The competition is there no matter where you look.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Well someone explain this: Q1 2010 in Japan

xx . [WII] Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles (Capcom) - 01/14/10
xx . [WII] Tatsunoko Vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars (Capcom) - 1/28/10
xx . [WII] Dance Dance Revolution: Music Fit (Konami) - 1/28/10
xx . [WII] Madworld (Sega) - 2/10/10
xx . [WII] Radirgy Noa Wii (Milestone) - 2/10/10
xx . [WII] Zangeki no Reginkleiv (Nintendo) - 2/11/10
xx . [WII] Super Monkey Ball: Athletic (Sega) - 2/25/10
xx . [WII] Daikaijuu Battle: Ultra Coliseum DX - Ultra Senshi Daishuuketsu (Namco Bandai) - 2/25/10
xx . [WII] GTI Club World: City Race (Konami) - 2/25/10
xx . [WII] Oyako de Asobo: Miffy no Omocha Bako (Square Enix) - 3/18/10

xx . [PS3] James Cameron's Avatar: The Game (Ubisoft) - 1/07/10
xx . [PS3] Batman: Arkham Asylum (Square Enix) - 1/14/10
xx . [PS3] Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising (Codemasters) - 1/14/10
xx . [PS3] Bioshock (Spike the Best) (Spike) - 1/14/10
xx . [PS3] End of Eternity (Sega) - 1/28/10
xx . [PS3] Ar tonelico III: Sekai Shuuen no Hikigane wa Shoujo no Uta ga Hajiku (Namco Bandai) - 1/28/10
xx . [PS3] MAG: Massive Action Game (SCE) - 1/28/10
xx . [PS3] Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard (D3 Publisher) - 1/28/10
xx . [PS3] WWE Smackdown Vs. Raw 2010 (THQ) - 1/28/10
xx . [PS3] Last Rebellion (Nippon Ichi Software) - 1/28/10
xx . [PS3] Fight Night Round 4 (Eigoban) (Electronic Arts Victor) - 1/28/10
xx . [PS3] Need for Speed Undercover (EA Best Hits) (Electronic Arts Victor) - 1/28/10
xx . [PS3] Star Ocean: The Last Hope - International (Square Enix) - 2/04/10
xx . [PS3] Lair (PlayStation 3 the Best) (SCE) - 2/04/10
xx . [PS3] Sacred 2: Fallen Angel (Spike) - 2/10/10
xx . [PS3] Winter Sports 2010: The Great Tournament (Arc System Works) - 2/10/10
xx . [PS3] Resident Evil 5: Alternative Edition (Capcom) - 2/18/10
xx . [PS3] Heavy Rain (SCE) - 2/18/10
xx . [PS3] Dynasty Warriors Online: Kamishou Ranbu (Koei) - 2/18/10
xx . [PS3] Dante's Inferno (Electronic Arts Victor) - 2/18/10
xx . [PS3] Skate 2 (EA Best Hits) (Electronic Arts Victor) - 2/18/10
xx . [PS3] No More Heroes: Heroes' Paradise (Marvelous Entertainment) - 2/25/10
xx . [PS3] No Fate! Only the Power of Will (Alchemist) - 2/25/10
xx . [PS3] Bioshock 2 (D3 Publisher) - 3/04/10
xx . [PS3] Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Electronic Arts Victor) - 3/11/10
xx . [PS3] Yakuza 4: Densetsu o Tsugumono (Sega) - 3/18/10
xx . [PS3] Virtua Tennis: Live Match! (Sega) - 3/25/10
xx . [PS3] Army of Two: The 40th Day (Electronic Arts Victor) - 3/25/10
xx . [PS3] Quantum Theory (Tecmo) - 3/25/10
Also GT5 and Hokuto Musou are scheduled for Q1

xx . [360] James Cameron's Avatar: The Game (Ubisoft) - 1/07/10
xx . [360] Batman: Arkham Asylum (Square Enix) - 1/14/10
xx . [360] Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising (Codemasters) - 1/14/10
xx . [360] End of Eternity (Sega) - 1/28/10
xx . [360] Eat Lead: The Return of Matt Hazard (D3 Publisher) - 1/28/10
xx . [360] WWE Smackdown Vs. Raw 2010 (THQ) - 1/28/10
xx . [360] Stoked (Russel) - 1/28/10
xx . [360] Fight Night Round 4 (Eigoban) (Electronic Arts Victor) - 1/28/10
xx . [360] Sacred 2: Fallen Angel (Spike) - 2/10/10
xx . [360] Dante's Inferno (Electronic Arts Victor) - 2/18/10
xx . [360] Resident Evil 5 (Platinum Collection) (Capcom) - 2/18/10
xx . [360] Espgaluda II: Black Label (Cave) - 2/25/10
xx . [360] No More Heroes: Heroes' Paradise (Marvelous Entertainment) - 2/25/10
xx . [360] Borderlands (Microsoft Game Studios) - 2/25/10
xx . [360] No Fate! Only the Power of Will (Alchemist) - 2/25/10
xx . [360] Bioshock 2 (D3 Publisher) - 3/04/10
xx . [360] Akatsuki no Amaneka to Aoi Kyojin (5pb.) - 3/11/10
xx . [360] Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (Electronic Arts Victor) - 3/11/10
xx . [360] Chaos;Head - Love Chu*Chu! (5pb.) - 3/25/10
xx . [360] Army of Two: The 40th Day (Electronic Arts Victor) - 3/25/10
xx . [360] Quantum Theory (Tecmo) - 3/25/10

The Xbox360 has twice as many games coming out in Q1 than the Wii.
Even the licensed/movie tie-in (Avatar) isn't coming to the Wii at the same time(or at all?).

[NWR_Lindy]

It may be that third-parties don't feel like Nintendo would give their titles the same marketing support as they do their own titles.  It'd be hard to green-light a non-family-oriented Wii game knowing that the odds are stacked against it because 1) It's not family-oriented, and 2) Nintendo won't help you market it, guaranteeing that it'll languish on the shelf.

[NeoStar9X]

It may be that third-parties don't feel like Nintendo would give their titles the same marketing support as they do their own titles.  It'd be hard to green-light a non-family-oriented Wii game knowing that the odds are stacked against it because 1) It's not family-oriented, and 2) Nintendo won't help you market it, guaranteeing that it'll languish on the shelf.

Now that's a question of why should Nintendo advertise their games? It's not as if Nintendo is the publisher. Do Sony and Microsoft spend extra money to advertise the games of other publishers? It would be one thing if they needed some extra help to reach more markets or advice on how to advertise the game but they don't even do small advertising where people will see it on their own. It's not as if these companies don't have the money either. Capcom for example had no problems at all advertising Resident Evil 5 and Street Fighter 4. However they did nothing at all for Resident Evil: Darkside Chronicles. They could have actually thrown RE:DC on the back of a commercial for one of the other games and it wouldn't have cost them more.

It's situations like that make it hard for me to accept it could be them looking to Nintendo for marketing support. They could do it on their own. Activision pretty much had a media black out on Modern Warfare Reflex, even now after MW2 made tons of money they still have a blackout on it. One could say they didn't want to have people confuse it with MW2. That's a leap and paints a picture of Activision thinking customers are stupid but okay. EA on the other hand, the giant that it is, for as proud they say they are of Dead Space: Extraction didn't lift a finger in pushing the game. It was a prime example of sending out a game to die. They again could have simply thrown it on the back of a commercial for one of their own games they were already advertising and it wouldn't have cost them the money to make a new commercial.

[BlackNMild2k1]

^I've made a similar argument in some other thread, so I agree with you completely.

Iwata has even gone on record stating that they are gonna try and step in and help 3rd parties advertise more, and I guess it ameks sense, because Nintendo realizes that the games being bought (1st or 3rd party) for the Wii/DS the money they make in not only licensing fees ubt in hardware sales and the more likely it is that that franchise will stick with that Nintendo platform if it finds it's audience. So in effect Nintendo is agreeing to help with advertising of lazy publishers properties because they are trying to set up a productive and profitable future for the current and next gent gen systems.

Next step is to start licensing properties from 3rd parties and develop them themelves....

[NeoStar9X]

Licensing the properties is weird step to take. They might simply be better off continuing what they did with Retro Studios. Buy a studio here and there and have them do their own thing. If they have a great IP that would be great. Nintendo I think made a mistake letting Rare go in terms of IPs alone. They should have put down the money to keep them out of Microsoft's hands. Perfect Dark with Wii controls would have been great. Rare trying to out do Nintendo with Banjo-Kazooie (which is more home among the Nintendo IPs anyway. Always was.) would be great to see.

It's looking more and more like Nintendo has to create a mini-industry within itself to get fair treatment. In a way they seem to be going in that direction. They have their internal studios which have been changed and renamed over the last decade or so. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nintendo_developers#Current_Development_Teams

Then you have their subsidiaries.

Retro Studios, Project Sora, Nd Cube, Monolith Soft, and Brownie Brown

BB seems to be a DS developing team (hope they are still doing the Magical Starsign series and that one game wasn't the last) and Nd Cube according to wiki is still rebuilding itself after losing a lot of people.  Retro, Sora, and Monolith Soft seems to be the only ones actively working on things.

Then their partner studios. The 2nd party developers as the name goes.

AlphaDream (These are the guys that did the Mario & Luigi games),  Jupiter Corp., Agenda, Monster Games, Kuju Entertainment, Paon, Skip Ltd., Noise, Game Freak (Pokemon), Indieszero, SUZAK Inc., TOSE, Ambrella.

The thing is most of this group have been making Nintendo DS or WiiWare games. Two of these are responsible for the Excite games and the Donkey Kong Beat game.  I wonder why Nintendo hasn't gotten some of these guys to do some Wii games (casual or hardcore or inbetween). They clearly are on better terms with Nintendo then many of these 3rd parties could ever hope to be.

So Nintendo has the teams and access to teams. It seems 3rd party developers in general (there are exceptions of course) aren't going to treat the Wii the same as the other two systems for whatever reason I wonder why Nintendo keeps holding back.

[broodwars]

So Nintendo has the teams and access to teams. It seems 3rd party developers in general (there are exceptions of course) aren't going to treat the Wii the same as the other two systems for whatever reason I wonder why Nintendo keeps holding back.

Well that's simple enough.  Nintendo's made huge profits this generation on projects that don't command many resources and few teams.  Why waste your other talent making big name Wii projects when clearly the market doesn't give a damn?  The only people Nintendo's angering with their half-assed approach to the Wii these past few years are people like us, and we are certainly in the minority in buying power these days.

Addendum: Besides, the Japanese are going through a period right now of just incredible dominance by the handhelds, so I guess it makes sense to give those projects higher priority right now.

[BlackNMild2k1]

It's no secret that Nintendo's main priority is the market in Japan before the market in the US and then the market in Europe, with the European and US market switching places from time to time.
Nintendo has made enough money this gen to play both sides of the fence.

But this thread isn't so much about what Nintendo has done wrong, but how they are being done wrong.