Messages

1201

TalkBack / Re: Remembering Super Mario Bros.

« on: September 17, 2015, 07:55:49 PM »

It's interesting when I hear stories like Ian Sane's, because that was not my experience at all. We viewed systems before NES as being old and lame, but even in 1989 and 1990 kids still thought that the NES was awesome, regardless of when games were released on it. It wasn't until a few years into the 16-bit generation and kids started getting SNES and Genesis systems that we started viewing the NES as old, though I don't recall anyone thinking it was lame and still liked some of the games. We weren't ingrates and were very appreciative of the things we had.

Oh the NES was still seen as awesome until the SNES came out (though some people were getting on board the Genesis bandwagon and I knew one guy with a TurboGrafx-16).  It's the old style blocky graphics boxart games like SMB, Mario Bros, Duck Hunt, Donkey Kong that were seen as "old".  Like those games were passe and you were to play newer games like SMB2, Zelda, Castlevania, Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden, etc.

Although I grew out of it probably around grade 9, the general vibe I got from my classmates through elementary and high school was that anything older than two years was fucking old.  Hell I remember around 1996 a guy telling me that the Smashing Pumpkins song Bullet with Butterfly Wings was old while 1979 was not.  I pointed out they were on the SAME ALBUM.  His response "nah, 1979 is on disc 2".  Always remember that minors are STUPID.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: NX Rumors and Speculation Thread (Unprecedented partnership with Square Enix?)

« on: September 17, 2015, 06:51:34 PM »

Nintendo has entered the videogame equivalent of the Tyson Zone (maybe it should be the Mr. Dream Zone).  For those unaware the Tyson Zone is when a celebrity (ie: Mike Tyson) has such a reputation for being wild and crazy and you can make up anything about them and it sounds plausible.  While Nintendo isn't quite at that stage, in regards to general competency within the videogame industry they are at that point where the most ludicrous and idiotic ideas sound plausible.

So the NX being literally just the Wii U with a new hat scrolling L&R buttons would be such an idiotic idea but because Nintendo is in the Mr. Dream Zone it sounds totally like something they would do.

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TalkBack / Re: GameStop To Stop Selling Consoles With Bundled Digital Codes

« on: September 17, 2015, 06:32:11 PM »

Ian, how does this affect you at all? No one was forcing you to buy a hardware bundle, and I hope none of the console manufacturers gives in to GameStop's policy. I hope this causes GameStop to suffer by having gamers get their bundles at other retailers.

Well I don't own a Wii U and I don't really see non-bundles available for it.  When I get around to getting one it would be nice if the bundled game was a physical copy since that's what I would prefer.  I don't care for Gamestop but if the manufacturers cave on this then the consumers get both options available to them and can choose based on their preferences.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: A Post-"Please Understand" Company: Nintendo After Mr. Iwata's Passing

« on: September 17, 2015, 05:18:59 PM »

Iwata's legacy is that he alienated the traditional gaming market in favour of mainstream casuals that dug Nintendo's product as a fad and then went on to something else, leaving the Wii U struggling to find an audience.  He burned bridges with the only audience in a post-smartphone market that will support a dedicated videogame machine.  So if Nintendo plays "what would Iwata do?" that will lead them to ruin.

Though he certainly was talking it up like he was going to change course. And we all kind of know that the Wii U is getting replaced next year, right?  There isn't time for the new president to overhaul everything for next gen.  Whatever Iwata had cooking has to go through unless Nintendo wants to sit on the unhealthy status quo for a bit longer to rethink their strategy.  I don't trust Iwata's vision, whatever it is, because I had no faith in him, but I can't see any other course of action than to stick with his short term plans.

Obviously I'm not happy he died but the real time to have replaced Iwata was when that disastrous financial report came out that more or less confirmed the Wii U as a flop.  That was the time to try someone new.  They didn't and if Iwata was in good health they wouldn't even consider replacing him until after the NX had come out and had been given some time to assess it's success or failure.  I highly doubt if the NX flopped that Iwata's job would have been safe.  So Nintendo might as well act as if he hadn't died and was given the chance with the Wii U successor that Nintendo's board had given him.  Then act like he was planning on retiring after seeing where the NX goes and then transition to his successor.

1205

TalkBack / Re: GameStop To Stop Selling Consoles With Bundled Digital Codes

« on: September 17, 2015, 04:47:03 PM »

As someone that prefers physical media this works out better for me.  But obviously the reason Gamestop is doing this is because one can't trade in a downloaded game.  Because their whole used game business model only works with physical copies they're going to try to discourage digital downloads.

1206

TalkBack / Re: Remembering Super Mario Bros. 2 (USA)

« on: September 16, 2015, 01:05:22 PM »

I remember I got a Mario sticker book as a kid and since I didn't own an NES that was how I became really familiar with the Mario characters and enemies.  The book only contained SMB1 and 2 as there wasn't really anything else yet.  At the time a game like SMB2 didn't seem that weird because Zelda II and Castlevania II came out the same year and were also quite different from their predecessors.  It was like a thing on the NES that the second game in a series was the different one.

Because this was so different, and because I had no idea the Lost Levels existed, I was initially unimpressed by SMB3 because it went back to the SMB1 style and that seemed lazy to me.  At that point the Mario series had gone SMB1, SMB2 and Super Mario Land so everything was pretty different.  Even the last bosses were different each time and then SMB3 was going back to Bowser.  Had I known that SMB2 wasn't really a "proper" Mario game then I wouldn't have been so outraged but Nintendo had inadvertently created an expectation for the series in North America that would never have been that way if we got the same releases the Japanese did (SMB3 even predates SML over there so they had three titles in a row with similar gameplay).

I'm still waiting for Nintendo to finally make another Mario game that plays like this and you figure the NSMB series would be the perfect chance to do so.  I also want another Zelda II.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: NX Rumors and Speculation Thread (Unprecedented partnership with Square Enix?)

« on: September 15, 2015, 01:24:22 PM »

Perm, that is an awesome idea!  The only problem I see is the price might be too high.  Essentially they're forcing someone to buy both the handheld and console at the same time when they might just want one.  I think some ability to buy just the handheld needs to be available for parents wanting to buy their kids an inexpensive handheld for Pokémon.  The idea needs good marketing too to really make people aware of how the one system serves as a handheld and console.

Of course Nintendo is totally not going to do this.

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TalkBack / Re: Meet Nintendo's New President Tatsumi Kimishima

« on: September 15, 2015, 01:08:58 PM »

Obsolescence and future proofing: All we can really do is hope they take care of this. Blue ocean was great, but sometimes you can be too blue ocean. I kinda wish Nintendo would reel it in and do something more traditional for a change. All these video games are about is entertainment. One could compare it to watching an annual event where it's the same every year with slight changes of flare. Over the years though, there are other shows going on that are more like your old shows. You can try to dazzle them with new things every year, but there are standard things that people want. I'd rather have something iterative next generation. NX sounds like it could be wacky, but it might not be. I could imagine NX having a tablet controller(but like a good tablet you can take anywhere)

When Nintendo was really awesome their hardware was pretty traditional but the games were ambitious and original.  In the Iwata era the games became generic and safe while the hardware became weird and non-traditional.  A 2D Mario game that uses a goofy controller is not innovative or bold or original - it's using a dumb gimmick to hide a lack of creativity.  If conventional hardware means that Nintendo's games have to become less creative then it just means that Nintendo are out of ideas.  To me a conventional console would be Nintendo getting back on the path they already were on before Iwata steered them off.  Donkey Kong used typical arcade hardware for the time with a conventional joystick and buttons.  This idea of using non-traditional controls in lieu of hardware power only started with the DS and Wii.

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TalkBack / Re: Meet Nintendo's New President Tatsumi Kimishima

« on: September 14, 2015, 07:48:33 PM »

Nintendo doesn't need someone to shake things up; Nintendo was already doing that when it decided to go mobile. Nintendo needs steady hand after Iwata's passing which is exactly what Kimishima provides. You know what you're going to get from the guy. Still, he's a transitionary president, someone who knows how to run a business and to hold the fort down while Nintendo prepares a younger generation took eventually take over. They'll be the ones with the bold new ideas.

I think it all depends on exactly what path Iwata started Nintendo down before his death.  If he's aimed the bus towards the cliff I want the new president to be able to recognize that and put on the brakes.  Nintendo does themselves no favours by staying the course if the course charted is their typical insanity.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: NX Rumors and Speculation Thread (Unprecedented partnership with Square Enix?)

« on: September 14, 2015, 03:42:54 PM »

I think the real important thing is that some very specific effort is made to try to win third parties back.  They should be acknowledging that they have completely fucked that up over the last few generations and that it should be the top priority to fix that.  With the Wii U it comes across like they just designed the thing primarily for their own personal needs and if third parties could shoehorn in, great.  They stand a chance to improve it if they actually make some real effort to do so.

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TalkBack / Re: Tatsumi Kimishima Named President of Nintendo

« on: September 14, 2015, 02:50:51 PM »

Hey, he's smiling in that photo!

This guy seems strictly business and not a videogame guy.  But then Yamauchi wasn't a videogame guy and I generally think he ran the company quite well until the N64, and even then I find the N64 did the best job of making the most of a bad situation out of Nintendo's post-SNES consoles.

But then if someone is going to turn them mobile only it would be a business guy who doesn't know games.  Since he's been part of Nintendo for long I'm hoping he's not dazzled by mobile like a newbie to videogames might be.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Super Mario Maker

« on: September 14, 2015, 01:58:12 PM »

We had super smash bros. for both 3ds and wii u, yet we don't have Super Mario Maker for 3ds. I mean really, I get how Nintendo is trying to create some sort of console exclusivity, but it's not going to go very well for your 3ds fanbase if you're only going to release the high demand games on wii u because once you leave 3ds users in the dust, more people are going to buy the wii u, and then the 3ds won't sell well anymore because more people are buying the wii u solely for its game library. Then once they try to release a popular 3ds exclusive game, new and old wii u users are going to be screaming about how it's only on 3ds, just like we are about a portable port (which I do agree with you on how much of a great idea that is). Plus, it's Mario's 30th anniversary, so why not put it on all modern nintendo consoles, as well as form a more similar game library among popular games on both 3ds and wii u?


Oh and by the way, the fact that the wii u won't sell very well in the end is nintendo's fault (no offense to wii u lovers).   

The fact that I'm thinking "man, I kind of want to get a Wii U for this" is the exact reason why they shouldn't release a 3DS version.  For the most part the 3DS has been completely sufficient for me to get my Nintendo fix and I see that as a huge ****-up on Nintendo's part.  If the console is just a prettier 3DS experience on a TV then that's not worth $300.  The console needed unique games like this early on.

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TalkBack / Re: Meet Nintendo's New President Tatsumi Kimishima

« on: September 14, 2015, 01:23:37 PM »

This shouldn't matter but he looks grumpy in that photo.  Very different demeanor than Iwata or Miyamoto.

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TalkBack / Re: Tatsumi Kimishima Named President of Nintendo

« on: September 14, 2015, 01:17:11 PM »

I don't know the name.  NOA wasn't exactly blowing me away during the Cube years but they were brilliant compared to how they've been since.  This is probably an improvement?  Maybe?

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: NX Rumors and Speculation Thread (Unprecedented partnership with Square Enix?)

« on: September 11, 2015, 12:59:07 PM »

Well Nintendo can stick with the Cube architecture which benefits literally themselves alone and then the third party support can continue to be virtually non-existent or they can go with x86 architecture and stand a chance of getting including in multiplatform development.

1216

TalkBack / Re: Super Mario Maker Update Changes Unlock System

« on: September 10, 2015, 04:54:05 PM »

Wow, these guys caught on quick enough to have the patch ready before release?  Do my eyes deceive me or is Nintendo learning?  Earlier in the year they released the Project S.T.E.A.M. demo and it had these ridiculous long wait times for the computer opponent's moves and it did not go over well.  Like this that was not a technical limitation or mistake but misguided intentional design.  Nintendo waited until after the game was released and sadly bombed before they caved and released a patch.  Now Super Mario Maker was never going to bomb like S.T.E.A.M. did just based on the Mario licence alone.  But Nintendo actually caught on fast enough to "fix" their questionable design prior to the release.  Were there technical hurdles that made the S.T.E.A.M. patch take longer or is Nintendo catching on?

This is a very obscure reference but to me Nintendo is "pulling a Sopel".  Former Vancouver Canucks defenseman Brent Sopel used to periodically pull off highlight reel defensive plays... but they were almost always in reaction to some boneheaded ****-up he had made seconds before that created the very need for him to save the day.  Good on Nintendo for addressing this but you question why this was in need of being addressed in the first place.  Next time around a design like this shouldn't make it out of the planning stages.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: NX Rumors and Speculation Thread (Unprecedented partnership with Square Enix?)

« on: September 10, 2015, 01:05:04 PM »

Replacing the successful system first while leaving the unsuccessful one to fester for another year is stupid... so I'm starting to become convinced that that IS Nintendo's course of action.  The best way to predict Nintendo is to think of what you would very specifically NOT do if you were calling the shots.

What happens if their next handheld for whatever reason struggles?  Remember how the 3DS initially didn't do to well.  So imagine that occurring while the Wii U struggles for another year.  What kind of profits does Nintendo show for that year?

It seems clear that there is a unified strategy for both platforms this next time around.  If the first one fails they likely will need to rework the other one to avoid the same fate.  What if the NX concept has some key feature that is a complete disaster?  If the handheld introduces the concept first and it bombs then they don't have anything solid to fall back on.  If they did the console first and it bombed they could hang on with the 3DS for a bit while they rethink their strategy.

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TalkBack / Re: Legend of Legacy Lands Demo

« on: September 10, 2015, 12:51:54 PM »

This games sounds cool in theory but the comparisons to the SaGa series freaks me out a bit.  Since I'm on the fence a demo will be perfect.

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TalkBack / Re: Pokemon Go Mobile Augmented Reality Game in Development

« on: September 10, 2015, 12:30:44 PM »

So how long until a misguided mobile effort moves the bulk of the Pokémon fanbase off of Nintendo devices onto phones?  The target audience of Pokémon are kids and kids are dumb so if you give them something close enough to the real Pokémon on a phone then they'll probably be content with that.  Then they aren't begging their parents for a Nintendo handheld.  Pokémon is the LAST Nintendo IP I would put on phones.  As a turn based RPG it actually can be adapted to the mobile interface pretty easily.  If Pokémon works on phones then the "need" for a dedicated handheld videogame system for like 90% of the general public isn't there.  WE know you need something designed more with games in mind to get a wide variety of good games but we're a dedicated minority.  When a kid asks for a Nintendo handheld Nintendo should never be giving the parent the excuse to say "Pokémon is on our phone, just play it there".

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Pikmin 4 already in development...

« on: September 09, 2015, 02:21:24 PM »

If Zelda doesn't matter anymore than neither does Mario and Nintendo is basically fucked unless they somehow bust out a new IP for the NX that catches on like Pokémon did.  I would figure a new Nintendo console launching with Zelda would stand a better chance at catching attention then one without.

I think gamers like Nintendo games they just aren't willing to put up with Nintendo's idiotic bullshit to get them.  They're not worth enough to justify buying a console with zilch third party support and last gen graphics that's whole selling point is an expensive screen controller no one gives a **** about and Nintendo barely even uses in any meaningful way.  Few games of any sort can overcome that.

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TalkBack / Re: Remembering Super Mario Bros.

« on: September 09, 2015, 02:12:34 PM »

My memory of SMB is going to be kind of a downer.  To me it was "that old game".  I didn't have an NES when I was a kid and didn't really become aware of it until probably about 1987 or 88 through kids at school.  At that point many sidescrolling games that were clearly inspired by SMB had come out and made it look outdated in comparison (for example SMB has one boss that repeats while all the then current games had multiple unique bosses).  I missed that impact of seeing SMB as a big jump up from one screen high score games.  The idea of multiple scrolling levels was just what videogames were so I didn't see it as some big innovation.  SMB also was a pack-in which us kids saw as a sign of inferiority (basically if you still played Mario 1 it meant your parents were too cheap/poor to buy you another game) and it had the ultimate kiss of death - the old blocky style graphics on the cover.  We associated that with old ass games like Excitebike and Donkey Kong.  Once games like Zelda and Mega Man had come out we didn't bother with those "old" games (yeah when you're six a game that is like 18 months old seems ancient).

So any real appreciation I have for the game is in retrospect as I became more familiar with videogame history and realized SMB's massive importance.  Of course I would still rather play SMB3 or SMW.

1222

TalkBack / Re: New Wii U Hardware Bundle Announced For United States

« on: September 08, 2015, 04:43:21 PM »

Well realistically I don't want a Wii U.  I want Pikmin 3, Super Mario Maker and Xenoblade Chronicles X.  I couldn't give a **** about the rest of it.  There are other games I'm sure I would enjoy but I'm not so interested that I really care about missing out on them.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Pikmin 4 already in development...

« on: September 08, 2015, 02:12:34 PM »

The Wii and Gamecube were practically the same hardware so having two versions was feasible.  I'm hoping the NX is enough of a step up that having dual releases would be challenging.  Of course a lot of PS4 games are also released on the PS3 so it would be the same idea.

I'm cool with a dual release but if one console is to be picked it's a no-brainer.  Offending the Wii U minority, that are all such Nintendo nuts that they'll buy the NX anyway, is a minimal concern compared to launching the NX with a bang.

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TalkBack / Re: Pikmin 4 In Development, Mario Galaxy Looking At New Hardware

« on: September 08, 2015, 01:40:14 PM »

There are parts of that Mario demo that I like and parts I don't.  I don't really want Mario to look like real life.  However the NSMB Mario style is incredibly dull and generic and I would like them to experiment a little more.  The Mario models they use these days look like they were intentionally designed to not push the hardware and be exchangeable between the handheld and console.  SSB tends to give the Mario characters a little more visual pizzazz than the "real" Mario game have since the Gamecube and that's more the style I would like.

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Nintendo Gaming / Re: Pikmin 4 already in development...

« on: September 08, 2015, 01:17:47 PM »

The NX needs to be successful.  If Nintendo cranks out another bomb aren't they pretty much finished in the console market?  No one is going to trust their brand after two flops.  So they could keep Zelda on the Wii U were it will please the small Wii U userbase and accomplish zilch for Nintendo in the long run or it could help ensure that the NX is successful and thus keep Nintendo as a console maker.  We'll all be better off if Nintendo can bounce back as a console maker.  Is having Zelda on the Wii U worth risking that?

And if they make Pikmin 4 as a tradeoff that's pretty cool because they often just leave the old system out to dry.  They could have given Wii U owners nothing so at least they're taking them into consideration.