Topic: The OFFICIAL Big N rumor thread *bring your own salt*

[Peachylala]

Nintendo wouldn't even keep Rare for their IPs and they could have easily been reorganized as Nintendo's "mature" brand.

So Nintendo should've kept Rare just for that, and release underwhelming games?

I remember reading some (thought I doubt it's true) that the money Nintendo made from selling Rare was used to form EAD Tokyo.

Bringing the Glory of Heracles series to the US made no sense,especially considering Mother 3 which already has a fanbase and wasadvertised in Brawl.

If Mother 3 got a DS port (which Brownie Brown has expressed doing), NoA has no real excuses to bring it over. We saw what Smash Bros. did for Fire Emblem, it can do the same for Mother 3.

Unless, of course, NoA makes excuses... just like third parties.

I also think Shiggy expressed his praise for the original Saturn NiGHTS. Get Shiggy to supervise a new NiGHTS, and it will be awesome.

[Adrock]

So Nintendo should've kept Rare just for that, and release underwhelming games?

Uh, no.... what are you talking about? The main reason, I would think, for Nintendo to buy Sega would be for their expansive IPs, most of them are broken series due to Sega's poor management. Nintendo owned what, like 49% of Rare. If they wouldn't even hold onto Rare, a company they already owned nearly half of, why would they spend even more money acquiring Sega? Relinquishing Rare was a tremendous idea. Nintendo could have probably reorganized Rare, like they did with Retro albeit on a much smaller scale, but ehh, why? Rare, like Sega, lost most of their key people. Nintendo could probably buy out Sega and reorganize the company. However, while it might be nice to get all those IPs, it's still probably more trouble than its worth. The alternative is to just do it themselves. Nintendo doesn't need other companies' IPs, they aren't EA (zing).

[BlackNMild2k1]

I just explained that. Nintendo could use the Sega properties to fill in the holes in their line-up, and use the Sega brand as their Hardcore Teen & Mature games factory.

And? My point still stands. Nintendo could always create their own brand to release "mature" titles, they don't need to spend millions to acquire Sega's losses and mostly broken IPs. The fact that Nintendo hasn't already, suggests to me that they aren't interested in either. Nintendo wouldn't even keep Rare for their IPs and they could have easily been reorganized as Nintendo's "mature" brand.

First of all, Rare was a mess and none of their IP were iconic.
Banjo & Kazooie, Joanna Dark and Conker were hardly enough to keep them around when most of their talent had left and the amount of time it took them to complete anything was beyond unsatisfactory. Rare's biggest game was Goldeneye, and that was based on a licensed property. The James Bond license has since been run into the ground. Selling them to MS was the best thing Nintendo could do with them and still make a significant profit since the company was just a shell of it's former self.

Like Deguello had said before, Nintendo had put in a bid on Sega before and it fell through at the last minute. Today, Nintendo has about 5-6x's the money and Sega is probably worth about the same now as they were then and they would be acquiring established franchises with a fanbase of 10's of millions spread across them. Lots of the IP's may have been a little tarnished, but if they are worth dusting off, Nintendo will do them justice and polish them up like new or better. And with Nintendo's whole "Nostalgia" kick right now, there is no better company to help complete the circle since it was all Nintendo & Sega throughout the 8 & 16 bit generations.

You also asked "Why should Nintendo spend millions acquiring Sega to rebuild their IPs?".
Well what exactly are they doing with Sonic right now, especially if the Sonic in Galaxy 2 rumor is true (where this whole conversation stemmed from)?

They already put him in SSBB, they teamed him up with Mario in the Olympic Games and next could be Galaxy2. Why do all this hard work at repairing Sonic's tarnished reputation if they weren't gonna be the sole beneficiary of it?
Just doin it to improve 3rd party relations with Sega? Might as well just buy them out and help Sammy out of the hole. Now there is no worries about Sonic making a come back and only appearing on someone else's console after Nintendo was the one that made him again.

[broodwars]

I'll say this: the idea of Sega producing new Skies of Arcadia and Valkyria Chronicles games exclusively for a Nintendo console (and really, those are the only games from Sega I'd care enough to have on a Nintendo console) is kind of awesome.  Sega could easily be Nintendo's "core" developer, as well as the one that experiments on new IPs.  I could definitely do without Sonic, though.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

It's not like Sega's gonna rebuild Sonic's image (and vice versa)!  LAFFO

[BlackNMild2k1]

Here is more talk on the "Nintendo to announce new platform at GDC" rumor:
http://www.nintendoeverything.com/32343/

Comments from Ubisoft and THQ.
Ubisoft employee response after being asked about it,
“I only leak when I go to the toilet. I do know it, but I’m not going to tell it MWOAAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Have fun speculating !�

and a comment from a THQ employee when asked about the same thing later
“Enough’s coming up, but I may not talk about it yet �

So, when is GDC again?

edit: to answer my own question.
GDC - March 9th - 13th, 2010 (San Francisco, CA)

[broodwars]

If Nintendo announces a new platform at GDC with THQ and UbiBoll standing beside them, I think James' head is going to explode.  :

[Mop it up]

Who or what is UbiBoll?

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

That's the championship event where the two worst 3rd Parties duke it out.

[broodwars]

Who or what is UbiBoll?

My personal nickname for Ubisoft (as in the notorious video game filmmaker Uwe Boll), considering how many terrible games they release yet they're still in business somehow.

[Adrock]

First of all, Rare was a mess and none of their IP were iconic.

And Sega isn't a mess? The last time they weren't a mess was when they were doing what Nintendon't pre-32X. Sega has Sonic and a bunch of niche IPs. I remember when Nintendo apparently went after Sega. It fell through probably because Nintendo realized they didn't need Sega or their IPs. While they'd be nice to have, Nintendo doesn't need them. What has changed since then? Nintendo is a more powerful company and Sega's IPs has fallen even further. As much as I'd love to see Nintendo fix Sonic and bring back Panzer Dragoon etc., it makes no sense financially to do so when Nintendo is doing perfectly fine without them. Nintendo is having trouble releasing entries in their own series. We've yet to see F-Zero, Star Fox, Pilotwings, Pikmin, etc. on the Wii. Go ahead, say it... Sega could develop F-Zero... jeez...

And I lol'd at you focusing on the Rare example (which I still feel is valid) while twice ignoring my suggestion that Nintendo could easily create their own brand of "mature" games. They don't need Sega, Rare or anyone else to do it. They are capable of hiring the talent needed for this. They simply don't want to.

You also asked "Why should Nintendo spend millions acquiring Sega to rebuild their IPs?".
Well what exactly are they doing with Sonic right now, especially if the Sonic in Galaxy 2 rumor is true?

They aren't. Nintendo would have spent millions making Super Mario Galaxy 2 with or without Sonic and it will sell millions with or without Sonic though maybe a little more with.

They already put him in SSBB, they teamed him up with Mario in the Olympic Games and next could be Galaxy2. Why do all this hard work at repairing Sonic's tarnished reputation if they weren't gonna be the sole beneficiary of it?

What hard work? Licensing Mario to Sega meant Nintendo got a fat paycheck for doing almost nothing. Miyamoto checked to make sure the games aren't utter crap while Sega handled all development duties. Including Sonic in Brawl was a response to fans wanting him in the game. More to the point though, licensing Sonic for Brawl and possibly Super Mario Galaxy 2 probably cost them far less, assuming it wasn't just a part of the previous deal. I hardly believe Nintendo would ever agree to either if they didn't benefit more from it, monetarily or otherwise. Sega probably got as sh*tty deal as SNK got for those vs. games with Capcom.

Might as well buy them out? Are you serious? A couple cameos and buying out then reorganizing an entire company are two completely different things. One requires minimal additional effort and the other is BUYING OUT THEN REORGANIZING AN ENTIRE COMPANY which may or may not pan out for them. While they're at it, Nintendo might as well buy out Capcom then having Platinum Games fix all of Capcom's still decent, but not as good franchises.

[BlackNMild2k1]

I never said Nintendo needed to buy anyone. I was speculating on the benefits of buying Sega and how they could be utilized.

As far an Nintendo establishing their own separate brand for mature titles. I didn't ignore it, I told you why they shouldn't with out addressing it directly. Why should they build that brand from scratch when Sega already has an established name that is in the everyday vocab of core gamers? Not only would they have a stable of already known IP's but they would also have several very capable development studios at their disposal who mostly only needed proper guidance to get a good game out the door.

And starting their own subsidiary to handle all their "core" mature titles over just buying Sega to do it for them? Are you serious? One requires minimal additional effort (already staffed and has lots of IPs to work on) and the other is STARTING THEN ORGANIZING AN ENTIRE COMPANY from scratch, which may or may not pan out for them.

[Deguello]

Bringing the Glory of Heracles series to the US made no sense, especially considering Mother 3 which already has a fanbase and was advertised in Brawl.

I'm not sure what your point is here.  You'd fault them for bringing over a game because it doesn't have an established fanbase and thus not as profitable?  Isn't that exactly what you are complaining about?

And it took Camelot 6 years to even announce a Golden Sun sequel. Who knows how long it take for them to even consider Shining Force IV?

They weren't doing nothing the whole time.  They were trying to make their way as an independent until We Love Golf bombed.  They're a small developer.  Cut them a break.

[Stratos]

Glory of Heracles is a Nintendo developed RPG series? This is news to me. I might have to check it out now.

[Deguello]

Well it's developed by Paon and published by Nintendo.  It's VERY complex.

This is actually the fifth game in a long running series developed by Data East.  But when Data East died, a lot of their employees made a new company, Paon.  They are very close with Nintendo, and so far this generation has only made games for the DS and Wii.  I don't know if Nintendo actually owns them, but they do publish a lot of their games.

Interestingly, Paon only owns three of their former series.  Glory of Heracles, this game called "Chelnov," and Internet sensation Karnov.  The rest are owned by some mobile content company called G-Mode, which means they are basically dead.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Karnov like the NES game?

[Peachylala]

Yes, and there was an arcade version as well.

[BranDonk Kong]

Karnov is one of the best NES games ever. The arcade game is great too.

[Adrock]

Why should they build that brand from scratch when Sega already has an established name that is in the everyday vocab of core gamers? Not only would they have a stable of already known IP's but they would also have several very capable development studios at their disposal who mostly only needed proper guidance to get a good game out the door.

Because it's far more cost effective to start a brand from scratch which is more in line with what Nintendo typically does. Sega has an established name that many gamers now associate withgarbage. Look at the reaction Sega got from announcing Sonic theHedgehog 4, a game people have been clamoring for. Inheriting a stable of already known IPs is great and all except Sega has ran most of them into the ground while the rest have been dormant for years. And clearly, Sega's dev studios are not very capable if they keep f*cking up their games. Don't give me that "proper guidance" nonsense. Many of those teams flat out ignored bugs and glitches. If you need to be told that glitches break games, that's not lacking guidance, that's being terrible.

And starting their own subsidiary to handle all their "core" mature titles over just buying Sega to do it for them? Are you serious? One requires minimal additional effort (already staffed and has lots of IPs to work on) and the other is STARTING THEN ORGANIZING AN ENTIRE COMPANY from scratch, which may or may not pan out for them.

I see what you did there, but it's not the same thing. Building they're own brand is more cost effective than buying up a billion dollar corporation. Nintendo could start small and build up while acquiring Sega requires them blow a lot of money up front.

I'm not sure what your point is here.  You'd fault them for bringing over a game because it doesn't have an established fanbase and thus not as profitable?  Isn't that exactly what you are complaining about?

Not faulting them. Simply pointing out that bringing Glory of Heracles over (which I'm happy they did) makes less sense than bringing over an established franchise like Mother 3. In a perfect world, I'd rather Nintendo release both, but if I had to pick one, I would have gone with Mother 3. That said, I have to wonder how Nintendo would handle Shining Force. I guess, if they went through the trouble of buying out Sega and resurrecting the series, they'd be more inclined to do more with it than just let it sit in Japan, but then again, they went through the trouble of resurrecting Mother 3 then let it sit in Japan despite fans begging for a release.

[BlackNMild2k1]

People don't associate Sega with Garbage, they associate them with bad sonic games.
Now imagine that Nintendo had announced Sonic the Hedgehog 4. What would you expect that reaction to sound like? If Nintendo had bought Sega, it's not like it would be a secret and only those 2 companies would have known about it. It would have been the talk all around the internet and anything that Sega announced from here on out, would have the blind yet cautious optimism that most Nintendo fans give all Nintendo games.

And starting from scratch slowly and maybe turning out the first game in 2 years vs buying Sega at a price(that is very affordable) with established IP's and games(that is plural) out the door in a matter of months since there are already projects in the pipe line,
is the difference between getting immediate turn around on your investment and having to nurture something by building WiiWare games or planning whatever they are doing for Wii2.  Sega sounds like the better move a this point.
(honestly though, I don't see why they couldn't do both. Buy Sega and start another dev house to do Mature games under the Sega brand)

As far as releasing games with known game breaking bugs, that's not so much the fault of the developer unless they are also the publisher. Deadlines have to be met, and the publisher decides when those deadlines are. Lots of developers don't have a say in a product being rushed to market for business reasons.

[Adrock]

No, people associate Sega with garbage.

How is Sega affordable? For comparisons sake, Rare cost Microsoft $375 million. Sega is a much larger company.

You're assuming that Nintendo would release most, if not all, of Sega's titles already in development. This is the same Nintendo that scraps entire completed/near-completed games (i.e. Miyamoto's "upending the tea table") such as Star Fox 2, the same Nintendo that halted development on Too Human so Silicon Knights could focus squarely on Eternal Darkness, and the same Nintendo that canceled all of Retro Studios projects except Metroid Prime then changed the direction of the entire game. Seems to me, considering Sega's penchant for releasing mediocre games, Nintendo would probably restart development or flat-out can most, if not all, of Sega's titles.

Nurturing a new dev is more in line with what Nintendo does (i.e. Retro). It's a safer bet and has worked out for them before. Nintendo could purchase Sega from Sammy and release a bunch of sh*t games to recoup some of their losses, but that wouldn't help them restore confidence in the Sega brand. It just makes it that much more difficult. See, I'm not saying that Nintendo couldn't pull it off. In fact, Nintendo is probably the only company that could because they're so shrewd when it comes to quality. However, I find partnerships like the one that's bringing us The Last Story as far more beneficial. Now, that game could end up being crap, but it's a smaller investment that brings us a brand new IP. Even if the experiment fails, Nintendo doesn't lose too much.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Well that's Nintendo's line of thinking too, as they've already stated that they prefer not to buy development houses because they talent could always just leave.

But Sega has lots of stuff that shows promise and they're best hop is to hope that Nintendo would buy them and start upending tea tables so that they can finally get their **** back together.

Is it likely that Nintendo will buy out Sega? of course not, but I think that if it was something that they were considering, it would be a good move for the IP's and back catalog alone. Secondarily it would just be a good foundation to push out Mature rated titles without tarnishing the Nintendo brand. There really is nothing more to say about it other than that's my opinion on the issue.
Nintendo doesn't need Sega, but they are a welcome addition to the family in my book. 

[Chozo Ghost]

Nintendo needs third party support. Since that doesn't seem to be happening on its own and since Nintendo has shitloads of cash these days, it seems logical that Nintendo should just buy up 3rd parties and then because they would now be owning these companies they could FORCE them to develop games for their systems.

[BlackNMild2k1]

You can't do that because the talent could always just up and leave.
In this work environment they probably wouldn't, but it's always a possibility.

I agree that Nintendo has more than enough cash to start making some big moves, but it can't just be hostile takeovers. There has to be some mutual understanding that this is the best move for the company being bought, and they have to want to develop willingly.

They really could use another high profile 2nd party or joint venture.
We just need to hear about more of the games that haven't been announced yet.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Non News: Nintendo working on NEW HARDWARE!!

Nintendo is developing new hardware.  And Shigeru Miyamoto, in addition to the new Wii Zelda game, is working on a motion-based game (or possibly games) that uses Wii Motion Plus.
Miyamoto himself mentioned these during a symposium at the 13th Annual Japan Media Arts Festival on Saturday.  4gamer filed a detailed report from the event.

Shigeru Miyamoto Discusses New Nintendo Hardware

After ages of speculation and rumors, Nintendo has finally confirmed that they're developing a new gaming system... sort of. During this year's Annual Japan Media Arts Festival, beloved game designer Shigeru Miyamoto talked up the projects he's currently working on: the next Legend of Zelda for the Wii, some kind of Motion-Plus-enabled game, and Nintendo's next hardware release (via Andriasang).The Mario creator didn't get down to specifics on the device, but this is still the first real acknowledgement of new hardware by one of the higher-ups at Nintendo. We'll have to wait and see whether he's referring to the rumored Wii HD, a successor to the DS, or something totally unexpected.

Now let the speculation continue.

Since we all know new hardware is always in the pipe line, at least we also now know that Miyamoto is working on more M+ based games other than Zelda.

Details from the original report that Andriasang was summarizing

��新�ード�開発も行���る�������，追��発表�れる���詳報を待�������.

rough translation by Kobun Heat of NeoGaf

Nintendo is working on new hardware and that an announcement could happen soon.

So once again, let the speculation continue.