Topic: Super Meat Boy WiiWare Cancelled

[NWR_insanolord]

If it were arbitrary, Nintendo would have changed it by now. I can't see how staying strict with it benefits them in any way, which leads me to believe they can't change it, or at least can't change it without a lot of work.

[Dirk Temporo]

If it were arbitrary, Nintendo would have changed it by now.

Just like Friend Codes, right?

[Morari]

If it were arbitrary, Nintendo would have changed it by now. I can't see how staying strict with it benefits them in any way, which leads me to believe they can't change it, or at least can't change it without a lot of work.

Maybe you haven't noticed, but Nintendo is historically famous for doing stupid things for no particular reason. They don't need to see any benefits in order to stick to their guns. Maybe it's an issue of pride? Fixing a mistake first requires you to admit that you made a mistake.

Regardless. I beat the game over the weekend. It was definitely worth the $3. Anyone who missed out while it was on sale for the PC should be ashamed of themselves.

[NWR_insanolord]

If it were arbitrary, Nintendo would have changed it by now. I can't see how staying strict with it benefits them in any way, which leads me to believe they can't change it, or at least can't change it without a lot of work.

Maybe you haven't noticed, but Nintendo is historically famous for doing stupid things for no particular reason. They don't need to see any benefits in order to stick to their guns. Maybe it's an issue of pride? Fixing a mistake first requires you to admit that you made a mistake.

They've caved to popular demand already on demos, even after trying them once before and then abandoning them.

If it were arbitrary, Nintendo would have changed it by now.

Just like Friend Codes, right?

1. Friend Codes aren't arbitrary; there's a difference between being arbitrary and being stupid. I may not agree with Nintendo's reasoning for them, but they at least have an argument. 2. You conveniently ignored the second part of my quote, where I said that changing this limit might be possible, but require too much work to be worth the trouble, which I would bet changing that system would too.

[TheBlackCat]

The developers thought that the 40 MB size limitation for Wiiware games was too strict.  Since they are not in the position to change Nintendo's policy internally, they decided to apply external pressure to the situation by making a great game that does not it within the (arbitrary) limitations.  I'm not sure Team Meat expected Nintendo to necessarily give them an exclusive exception, rather that they would change the policy for ALL developers.  If enough companies wish to release high profile downloadable games on the Wii that are over 40 MB, it's reasonable to expect Nintendo to change their policy because they stand to profit so much from changing the rules.

Nintendo gave no indication that we know of that they intended to change anything.  So Team Meat made a decision to develop a game they had no indication would ever have any chance of coming out. 

Have you ever heard the saying "hope for the best, plan for the worst"?  The reasonable course of action would have been to develop the game strictly for the size limit, but develop in such a way that they could add more content given time and a change in policy.  At the very least they should have been developing the game for a larger size limit, but leaving themselves ways to cut it down if the limit didn't change.  But they developed the entire thing based on the hard requirement that Nintendo changed the rules, and then had to scramble to totally re-design the game at the last minute.  I don't see how any half-competent business could put themselves in such a position, at least not ones outside of a field like law where changes are inevitable. 

Could you imagine someone writing a flash program targeted at the iphone, despite the repeated assertions by Apple that it will not support flash?  Does that seem like a reasonable business decision?  Would it be reasonable for them to play the victim card when Apple didn't change their policy by the time the software was finished?  I think the decision by Apple to not support Flash is as bone-headed as Nintendo's limit (assuming the limit is indeed arbitrary and easily fixed), but that is not excuse for developer making a program that they had no reason to think would ever actually work.

What about someone developing a program aimed at windows running on ARM processors?  It seems inevitable that Windows will eventually be ported to ARM, but that doesn't change the fact that a software developer who wrote such a program has no right to complain that it isn't out yet, since Microsft hadn't announced it was even going to happen, not to mention when.

Even if Nintendo's decision is arbitrary, even if it is stupid, even if it should be changed, it is still theirs to make, and it is not an excuse to ignore it.

I also think that Team Meat must have spoken to someone at Nintendo who at least implied that the limitation could be changed at some point in development (probably early on).  That's just a hunch though.

I strongly suspect that if Nintendo had done so Team Meat would have used that as a defense for their actions already.  The fact that they have made no mention of such a discussion despite all the flak they are getting for this indicates to me that no such conversation took place.

[KnowsNothing]

I'm not saying that what Team Meat did wasn't stupid, just that I think there was some sort of perverted logic to it all.  As Edmund McMillen said, they overestimated their ability to change the rules.  It was a gamble and they lost.  Oh well.  They're still at fault for marketing it as a Wii game and ignoring the limits, but I can't say I'm too angry at them for wanting to be the catalyst for a change long overdue.

And that last part about Team Meat speaking to Nintendo was just a random thought I had, but it likely isn't true.  Feel free to ignore that haha.

[Adrock]

One possibility may be the limitations of the Wii's 512MB of internal flash memory. If Super Meat Boy is 90.4MB, that's a little over 1/6 of the Wii's storage capabilities, even more considering some of that memory is reserved for system updates. Not sure if this is true, but I remember reading that the Wii runs games from the internal memory only and can't actually play any software from an SD card, it moves data back and forth between the SD card and internal memory. Perhaps the Wii can handle larger file sizes but Nintendo just drew the line at 40MB because transferring larger files from SD card to the Wii's internal memory is more trouble than its worth. Purely speculation on my part though.

Even if the above was the case, Nintendo's lack of foresight has, once again, cost them quality software and the biggest losers are Nintendo themselves because even if Wii owners would prefer to play the game on the Wii, they still buy the game because if they have the internet access, chances are they own a PC and can still experience the game. I'd honestly be surprised if any household with access to the internet had a Wii as the sole device that could go online.

But they developed the entire thing based on the hard requirement that Nintendo changed the rules, and then had to scramble to totally re-design the game at the last minute.  I don't see how any half-competent business could put themselves in such a position, at least not ones outside of a field like law where changes are inevitable.

See, the reality of the situation isn't anything like the picture you've painted. Team Meat developed the game knowing that they had 3 completely viable alternatives: XBLA, PC and Mac. Nintendo doesn't owe them anything and vice versa. The development team decided, instead, to make the best game they could knowing it could still be released and still offer the game to Nintendo who declined. So be it. I don't see how Team Meat is playing the victim card. They apologized to Wii owners but they're hardly licking their wounds. The game is out, they're making a profit on the game, Microsoft if making a profit on the game and the only company who isn't is Nintendo.

[Peachylala]

The game is out, they're making a profit on the game, Microsoft if making a profit on the game and the only company who isn't is Nintendo.

This is true, but Nintendo is making a profit on everything else (WiiWare or not), and any Wii owner jhas to have internet access for Steam. So Nintendo isn't missing out of the profits, just the game itself.

Though I find Super Meat Boy to be a great game, people are just making too much of a big deal out of it. Fun, but seriously, nothing to get too crazy over.