Topic: What Wii games deserve Nintendo's marketing $$$?

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

For every super-hyped piece of software Nintendo releases, there seems to be one or more Nintendo-published titles that Nintendo doesn't care for you (general public, not this forum) to know about.  What's up with that?

What's coming out this year that should have a healthy marketing campaign?  There's Mario Kart (and Brawl, region permitting), and there's... Mario Kart.  Yeah, Nintendo doesn't care to tell us.


"oh no you didn't!" OH YES I DID

this is a poll

[Ceric]

Professor Layton and the Curious Village.

[DAaaMan64]

None of them.  Nintendo's advertising sucks.

[ShyGuy]

Prime 3 retro promotion?

[Plugabugz]

Zack & Wiki. BWii. No More Heroes.

[IceCold]

Eternal Darkness.

[Kairon]

Third party games.

[Crimm]

Target Terror

[Ian Sane]

I maintain my belief that despite the Wii's success suggesting otherwise, Nintendo still is just as clueless about marketing as they've always been.  The difference between the Wii and the Gamecube is that the Wii is such an interesting product that merely finding out about it encourages people to check it out.  However the Cube was a console people wanted to ignore and Nintendo's marketing department couldn't provide them with an excuse not to.

The Wii succeeds despite Nintendo's marketing, not because of it.  In this case Nintendo is actually selling the steak instead of the sizzle.

[Kairon]

I maintain my belief that despite the Wii's success suggesting otherwise, Nintendo still is just as clueless about marketing as they've always been.  The difference between the Wii and the Gamecube is that the Wii is such an interesting product that merely finding out about it encourages people to check it out.  However the Cube was a console people wanted to ignore and Nintendo's marketing department couldn't provide them with an excuse not to.

The Wii succeeds despite Nintendo's marketing, not because of it.  In this case Nintendo is actually selling the steak instead of the sizzle.

You could say that marketing doesn't ever convince anyone to buy anything they don't want. All the marketting in the world may not be able to convince people to buy GameCube's, and maybe all this marketing today isn't actually convincing anyone to buy the Wii either.

[GoldenPhoenix]

I believe it is quite ignorant to say Nintendo doesn't know how to market, the strategy of the Wii and the overall focus of its design took advantage of one of the most important parts of marketing, getting a first mover advantage. There is more to marketing than commercials and Nintendo DOES know what they are doing, especially with a unique market where basic marketing strategies for gaming are not nearly as important. Now are they great with every facet of marketing? Nah, but who is? What matters is what they are doing is working, and it is pretty disrespectful to not give them credit for creating such a unique market whether you like their direction or not.

[NWR_insanolord]

To answer the original question: all of them. If Nintendo thinks enough of a game to release it it should be prepared to market it strongly.

[Chozo Ghost]

I'm not sure why, but it seems to me that Nintendo never really was very much interested in marketing. I think they probably figured it didn't make much difference to the overall success of a game. It seems back during the Genesis-SNES era that Sega spent a lot more on advertising and they came out with some "cool" commercials which appealed to the hardcore teenagers of the day, but I can't really remember any Nintendo commercials from that time.

Nevertheless, Nintendo did win the 16-bit era despite their poor marketing so maybe that was what gave them the idea that marketing doesn't really make much difference. And they also won the handheld war of that era too. Sega did a good job of pointing out how their gamegear had color and that the gameboy was as bland as spinach, but Nintendo won that war as well.

I think what it comes down to is Nintendo thinks word of mouth is a better way of selling games than with advertising. They probably think making a high quality game with minimal marketing is better than making a low quality game with heavy marketing. As the saying goes, cream rises to the surface and crap sinks to the bottom. Marketing can help a crappy game in the short term, but only a high quality game can be a long term success.

[Chozo Ghost]

Another thing I'd like to point out is that Wii Marketing is kinda pointless anyway with the shortage still in effect. If you have a product which sells out within 20 minutes of being on the shelf, then there is no real need to market it. Nintendo games have ALWAYS sold extremely well and have never needed much marketing anyway. We fanboys are largely responsible for that, because we have a tendency to buy anything Nintendo comes out with just because it is by Nintendo.

[Ceric]

NOA Still doesn't have a good Customer Reward program.  Even compared to Europe.  That is all.

[EasyCure]

I'm not sure why, but it seems to me that Nintendo never really was very much interested in marketing. I think they probably figured it didn't make much difference to the overall success of a game. It seems back during the Genesis-SNES era that Sega spent a lot more on advertising and they came out with some "cool" commercials which appealed to the hardcore teenagers of the day, but I can't really remember any Nintendo commercials from that time.

I can't think of any specific ads but i remember some of the ad campaigns like "play it loud" and "now you're playing with power, SUPER power!" and i remember the GB pocket commercials vaguely, but nothing for a specific game. Odd though that i do remember the Mario Bros 3 commercial. that thing was huge.

oh i also remember a funcoland commercial in which a kid was playing MegaMan X on a huge screen. that was random, sorry

[Nick DiMola]

Freshly-Picked Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland

[Arbok]

It seems back during the Genesis-SNES era that Sega spent a lot more on advertising and they came out with some "cool" commercials which appealed to the hardcore teenagers of the day, but I can't really remember any Nintendo commercials from that time.

I can... in fact, I will never forget the commercial for Yoshi's Island, simply as it was fairly disturbing to visualize a man eating so much he ruptures his gut.

EDIT: Yep, here is the one... Nintendo would never do something like this today:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbik52Cksww

[IceCold]

I've never seen that one before. Reminds me of Se7en.

[Chozo Ghost]

Man, that is very disturbing.... I guess Nintendo can appeal to the mature crowd after all, huh?

[animecyberrat]

nevermind nothing I said wasn't already said so move along.

[Adrock]

Games that deserve marketing $$$ are the ones that don't already sell extremely well on their own. Games like Smash Bros. don't need as much marketing muscle as something like, say, Fire Emblem.

[BlkPaladin]

I wonder is this in response (discust) that Nintendo said they are probally going to putting 80% of this year's advertising budget behind WiiFit. (At least by the sounds of it)

[EasyCure]

It seems back during the Genesis-SNES era that Sega spent a lot more on advertising and they came out with some "cool" commercials which appealed to the hardcore teenagers of the day, but I can't really remember any Nintendo commercials from that time.

I can... in fact, I will never forget the commercial for Yoshi's Island, simply as it was fairly disturbing to visualize a man eating so much he ruptures his gut.

EDIT: Yep, here is the one... Nintendo would never do something like this today:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbik52Cksww

haha i used to like that commercial, i cant believe i forgot about it. Seeing that though reminds me of one for Kirby on SNES. Some kid started turning pink and inhaling everything i think. too lazy to search youtube for it, im sure someone else will find it