Topic: I am a Nintendo fan because of third party games, but not of first party games

[Oblivion]

I was having a discussion with my good friend (Drizzt on the forums) and I realized while talking to him that I am not a Nintendo fanboy. Sure, I own more Nintendo consoles than any other, but I am not. If I listed the major Nintendo franchises, I dislike almost every one of them.


The Legend of Zelda? I only liked Wind Waker. Super Mario? I only liked the original, SMB3, and Galaxy. Mario Kart? I like them, but not enough to buy a console for it. Star Fox? If they ever make a true sequel to SF64, I'd be all over that. F-Zero? I only liked the original. Donkey Kong? Nope. Kirby? Nope. Fire Emblem? Only Awakening. Pikman? Meh. Even the one I like the most, Metroid, hasn't had a good game since the beginning of the Wii's life cycle, and I've always found the 2D games to be fairly too difficult for me.


As you can see, I am not a perfect Nintendo fan. However, what does get me excited with Nintendo's handhelds and consoles are the unique third-party experiences I can't get anywhere else. My favorite DS games were titles like Ghost Trick, 999, The World Ends With You, Scurge: Hive, etc. With the 3DS, the trend continues. I loved titles like Virtue's Last Reward, Mutant Mudds, Kingdom Hearts 3D, etc. more than I like Mario Kart 7 or Super Mario 3D Land.


On the Wii, my favorites were games like Red Steel 2, The Conduit, Goldeneye 007, Xenoblade Chronicles, Mad World etc. And again, this is true with the Wii U. I loved ZombiU, Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate, and Black Ops 2 (of all things) more than I liked Nintendo Land and New Super Mario Bros. U.


I was really hoping for more third party games for the Wii U. The Wonder 101 and X are looking promising, but those two are the exceptions. I'm really worried that my Wii U purchase will be similar to my 3DS purchase for the rest of 2013.

[NWR_insanolord]

If you're more interested in third party games, it's looking more and more like you really picked the wrong console.

[Ian Sane]

I find it very strange that your tastes would be like this at your age, instead of someone older that grew up with the NES and SNES.  Many "Nintendo fans" realized around 1997 that they were really fans of the third parties on Nintendo systems.

I'm a fan of Nintendo's commitment to quality, creativity and ambition, not specifically Mario or Zelda or Metroid.  As I feel Nintendo's focus has changed, the presence of Mario and the other franchises inspires no excitement in me.  The characters and the name don't matter but rather the substance of what those franchises used to represent (and sometimes still do).  I like Zelda because it is huge and ambitious and pushed the videogame medium forward, not because I go around Hyrule to get the 8 magic doodads from the 8 dungeons to defeat Ganon.  I think Nintendo has lost track of this.  They think I like Mario because he's that italian guy with the mustache and the red hat.  That had almost nothing to do with it.  I liked Mario because his games were cutting edge platformers.  Generic platformers like NSMB don't interest me because that's not what I liked Mario for.  Take away the ambition and creativity and Nintendo games cease to have any real value to me.

In regards to third party support is see the NES and SNES as the way things SHOULD be, the N64 and Gamecube as failed attempts to return things to normal and the Wii and Wii U as giving up.  Ultimately I like third party games that demonstrate the same virtues that Nintendo games do and as other companies can provide distinct approaches that Nintendo will not take, third party support is mandatory to provide true variety and selection.  It is not a coincedence that Nintendo has become more generic with each generation since the third party support dried up.  To not think that third party support is important is to not think that variety is important and if variety doesn't matter then it doesn't matter if your own games don't provide it.

[alegoicoe]

If you're more interested in third party games, it's looking more and more like you really picked the wrong console.

True; if that's the feeling now I can't imagine the n64 and Gamecube days.

[ThePerm]

I am a Nintendo fanboy, but i'm dissapointed in their unambitious attitude. They come across lazy, and really don't seem to care about what their doing. If I were to send a report card home to their parents they would get Ds and Hiroshi Yamauchi would get a cane and beat them for their insolence.

You see games like Mass Effect, Batman Arkham City, Assassin's Creed running on the Wii U and you know its a capable system. However, you don't see Nintendo making a game comparable to that like Metroid coming out for Wii U. You look at the sales and yes the numbers show Donkey Kong is a better seller. Those numbers are fucking skewed though. Metroid Prime 1 and 2 as released against Halo on a console with low numbers. Metroid Prime 3 looked dated when it came out. Metroid Prime Other M was more like an imitation of a Metroid game then a legitimate game(at least thats how the fans saw it). Donkey Kong Country Returns was released on a popular console during its peak.

Nintendo should not be releasing that sort of game right now, with their stock falling, and their sales abysmally low. The effort is the equivelent of what an indy studio could do. Nintendo can do more that what their doing.

its the equivelent of if someone won the lottery and decided to continue to live in a trailer park for their rest of their lfe, only eating microwave food, and never calling a plumber when the drains are clogged...instead just buying paper plates endlessly.

[Mop it up]

At first I figured this would have been posted by Kairon...

[Oblivion]

If you're more interested in third party games, it's looking more and more like you really picked the wrong console.

Not just third party games. I already get that with the Sony consoles I buy. I'm a Sony fanboy through and through, but like I said in the original post, I buy Nintendo consoles for the unique third party experiences I get with Nintendo.

I find it very strange that your tastes would be like this at your age, instead of someone older that grew up with the NES and SNES.  Many "Nintendo fans" realized around 1997 that they were really fans of the third parties on Nintendo systems.

What exactly do you mean? Are you saying that it took me a long time to figure this out or I haven't the attitude of a Nintendo fan from 15 years ago?

[Khushrenada]

I buy a majority of first party titles I'm sure but it depends on the system. With the DS for instance, I probably have more third party titles than first party titles or else the split is close like 50/50. With my N64, I only own First Party titles with maybe 2 third party titles. It depends on what they bring but with the DS, third parties did start to bring a lot of good unique titles that can only be found in it. That's what Oblivion is talking about and not something like Batman Arkham Origins which can be found on all the systems. Although it would be nice if more of those showed up. I'm really glad the Batman Arkham games have been coming to the Wii U as that is one of the few games on another console I really wanted to play. Arkham Asylum is still going to be my day 1 purchase when I get a Wii U.

As much as Nintendo has a lot of quality titles, I enjoy branching out and trying other things even if the quality isn't that high. For whatever reason, I still like Sonic Adventure 2 despite it's numerous flaws. I know it is easy to focus more on the first party titles becaus they are usually of a higher quality and more inventive than what third parties bring but even if there is some effort shown or a new idea, I'm willing to give it a try. You learn to appreciate different things in different games and if Nintendo isn't doing too much new at least that can fill such a need.

Still, in the end, it is rare that a third party game would be in my top ten list of a system. I'm a Nintendo fan because of first party games and not third party.

[Ian Sane]

I find it very strange that your tastes would be like this at your age, instead of someone older that grew up with the NES and SNES.  Many "Nintendo fans" realized around 1997 that they were really fans of the third parties on Nintendo systems.

What exactly do you mean? Are you saying that it took me a long time to figure this out or I haven't the attitude of a Nintendo fan from 15 years ago?

I mean that this was very much a relevant discussion 15 years ago when all the third parties went to the Playstation.  We saw what was originally seen as the Nintendo fanbase split into two groups, based on first or third party preferences.  You're too young to have been part of that so your attitude caught me by surprise.  I've always associated the post-SNES Nintendo as having very poor third party support so I would assume that anyone who indentified as a Nintendo fan that was not old enough to have become a fan during the NES or SNES eras would naturally be primarily a fan of their first party games since that has been the selling point of Nintendo systems since 1996.  Basically this is a new perspective from a Nintendo fan that I have not encountered before.
 
I agree with Perm about the lazy attitude Nintendo seems to have.  Essentially I think the Wii's success instilled bad habits in Nintendo.  I see the Wii as a fad that grossly overachieved.  It was last gen hardware with slippery **** controls, virtually no third party support outside of shovelware, and sold on the back of glorified tech demos that appealed to non-gamers without the proper perspective to realize how little of a "game" they were really buying.  I'm not so naive to not assume that in the past Nintendo was ambitious in their game design because they felt that was necessary for the product to sell.  On the Wii they learned that they could cut corners and half-ass it and still make a bundle... and they actually made MORE money than before with this approach.  So instead of making the best game they can the philosophy is reversed - make the worst product you can get away with selling.  They caught on to this largely dishonest concept with the Pokemon spinoffs pretty early on and under Iwata they have realized they can get away with this on pretty much everything.  Or so they thought.  The problem is the Wii was a fad and the fad is over and the same "bare minimum" approach on the Wii U has failed thus far and this E3 shows that Nintendo has not figured that out yet.

[Oblivion]

So I am a unique snowflake? I admit, I haven't really seen my opinion much on the Internet either.

[ShyGuy]

Looking at my libraries for the Gamecube, Wii, DS, and Wii U, I am in the same boat as you.

Love me some Zelda and Metroid though.

Games like Animal Crossing, Mario Party, Mario Kart,  I don't need to get every iteration because they are so similar. Not that this is a Nintendo exclusive phenomenon, Call of Duty, Need for Speed, Madden, are VERY repetitive and they come out once a year, not once a generation.