Topic: nintendo's appalling support in australia

[vroenis]

aside from having perhaps the lamest and shortest marketting and advertising for the cube at launch and after, we in australia are just being left behind.
several headline third-party titles have been discontinued - super monkey ball 2, skies of arcadia, burnout 2, robotech battlecry, pso I/II (though stock of this seems to turn-up at random in different stores around the nation...) just to name a few.
but now we come to product number 3.
every sunday we have a cube meet at a store, play games, talk etc - probably something that's quite rare in australia - in any case, the store ordered 20 copies of pn03.
our supplier received 5 copies.
we received one.
...
now i'm angry.
so our one copy is going to the guy who is the keenest to get it and ordered it first, but we have 14 other orders to fill, plus five spare copies which for sure will walk out the door.
why did this happen?
-
we understand that australia isn't the biggest market, but for god's sake, this is rediculous.  nintendo announce they're going to spend a zillion dollars on advertising in this country, then they send us a handful of copies of the most anticipated game at the moment.
sound's like a plan guys, yeah, maybe that will DETER anyone who was going to jump to the cube - finally some awesome games coming out on cube... that we'll never play.
oh no, but wait, at least FIVE people will...
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we are thinking about what we can do to make our cube club official, liaise with nintendo and see what we can get out of them, but at this point i'm very pesemistic.  we have about 15 regulars who turn up each week, but i get the feeling that this kind of thing has to start happening around the nation a lot more before nintendo notice us.
a whole bunch of clubs and meets need to form-up and make some noise, because nintendo just isn't going to help us on their own.

[PIAC]

holy poop on a stick that is terrible, where is your cubeclub? brisbane perhaps? ill join in

on a serious note, action is requied, that is utter foolishness :\ get everyone inloved to email nintendo, get the store to email nintendo, get the supplyer to email nintendo etc, im sure you probably allready have, or done something else, either way let your voice be heard!

[Infernal Monkey]

Yes, this is why I plan on pre-ordering all the top third party GameCube games soon, it'll set me back a few $10 notes, but it'll be worth it. 'Tis sad about P.N.03, I mean, hell, that's the only new game we're gotten here in what seems FOREVER, and it's already impossible to get? Arg.

Hopefully Nintendo won't piss away this $10 mill it's going to recieve on more 'GameBoy Gallery' style adverts. Ie: spend the money on stupid rubbish instead of stuff that is actually exciting. I'll NEVER forgive them for choosing to advertise GameBoy Gallery over Resident Evil and Eternal Darkness..  

[Ocarina Blue]

At least you're not in New Zealand, I live in a town of about 115 000, and about 25% of its population is students, who tend to buy alot of video games, especially consoles. In my town, there is one retailer that still stocks Gamecubes, and that retailer doesn't even get enough stocks of first party games (we had to wait one and a half months longer than Aussie for Metroid Prime), and we've never seen any of those third party games you mentioned here. I'm planning to import all my games now, although it doesn't send a very good message to Nintendo about their popularity here.  

[vroenis]

sorry PIAC, i'm in melbourne, but that doesn't mean that YOU TOO could start your VERY OWN CLUB today!
arg - yeah, but i know how difficult that can be.  it's hard to find cubists in this country - the store is actually a comic shop that stocks games as-well, we kind of just tried it out one week, the owner told everyone who came in to buy various gc and other stuff to all turn-up on sunday and we all did.
this kind of thing really needs to start happening here, even to the point of maybe when we have enough established groups, starting a nintendo con of our own - even if it's small and even if we do it once, it might just have enough possitive effect on the market in our country.  i know a con would be expensive, but perhaps it could start off as just a small meet interstate - pick wherever there are the most cubists, could even be brissy, and sure, i'll fly or drive up there, because for the price it'll be worth it.
arg - but that's a long way off.  doing a con would involve talking to nintendo (probably 'of australia' - arg) and getting them on-side, and that might be goddamn difficult.
i just don't want to see the cube die in australia, and i think it really is up to us as gamers to affect this.

[PIAC]

sydney would probably be the best idea, a middle ground for everyone on the east coast, only 12 hours by bus from Melbourne or Brisbane, and yeah, i would love a Con or something to happen, that would be awsome.

i could try start up a club dealy, but i dont actually know ANYONE around here, let alone cube fans

perhaps... we could hire some form of giant place in sydney, contact nintendo for sponsor ship (hello $10 million budget) and have a massive gathering, have them anually or even 6month...ually..dowab..

[Uncle Rich AiAi]

I'm from Melbourne too!  I don't know anyone who has a GameCube, beside the Aussies on this forum.

It would be nice to meet up with some GameCube owners in my city...

[oohhboy]

Fools, you import everything like I do, but my arrangments are som what special, so your mileage will vary. Anyway, I am so not paying good money for over priced games that are late and under-stocked with a horrible selection.  Hell even the GBA games are in the same condition to a milder degree. GBA game here are even more over priced.

But there are disadvantages to import, but for me they are mostly insignificant.

Same here AIAI. I don't know anybody in Auckland that has a GC, but that is not the point since I import everything and trading games would almost be out of the question.

[vroenis]

AiAi - where abouts in melbourne are you from?  are you familiar with footscray?
email me at anakha@opendiary.com if you're interested in the sunday meet.  if all goes well, i think this sunday is going to be a smash bros comp, though i think the draw is decided already - still, we have 2 tvs so one will be running other stuff, probably pso but i do try to play other games

[vroenis]

update.
finally got our shipment of pn03 from another distributor, so we'll all be playing it today, which leaves me with the question, who makes decisions about distribution - the publisher or nintendo?  or is it the orders that third-party distribution companies put in down here?

[Infernal Monkey]

Doesn't seem like Nintendo get a say when it comes to third party releases. It was all thanks to the IDIOTS at Game Nation that Skies and PSO only got like, what... Three copies shipped here?

"AWWWWW, NOBODY WILL WANT THESE GAMES! ALL PEOPLE WHO OWN GAMECUBE ONLY WANT ZAPPER, BECAUSE WE SAY SO! QUICK, LETS GET ANOTHER 40,000 COPIES OF TOMB RAIDER FOR PS2 ON THE SHELVES!"

[Shift Key]

vroenis: It's the supplier's fault. Those games were discontinued because a non-Nintendo supplier decided it was pointless to provide a large amount. Gamenation screwed me over with Skies (I completely missed the launch until PIAC told me he had his) and I only got Burnout 2 because my local EB got one out of nowhere.

As for the Cube Clubs, I don't know of any other GC fans like me around here. I know of some who have Cubes, but I wouldn't invite them along to something like this.

PIAC: There's always the summer holidays. I'm happy to make my way to Sydney, as long as work allow me to get some time off *shakes fist*

Infernal:
*scene at GameNation*
Boss: "This Gamecube order is missing something! Joe, what else can we ship?"
Joe:  "We've got 500 copies of DOA: Xtreme Beach Volleyball."
Boss: "But they're for XBOX."
Joe: "And?"
Boss: "OK, make it happen."

Ooh, I hate those fools.

[Termin8Anakin]

Hey!
If you guys are so willing to come here to Sydney, then why don't you?
Me, Mario, J oey and Infernal have already had a meet to play games.

And PNO3 is already out?

[Infernal Monkey]

Yeah, well, it was meant to come out today.

[Hybrid Hunter]

I just hope the marketing campaign Nintendo is about to pull off comes with games too and not just commercials!
I eventually want to play Pn: 03 and viewtiful!

[vroenis]

i got my copy of pn03 launch day, but only because we fought for it - the supplier we got it from is actually in brisbane - how's that!
apparently one of the guys from the club went to a big place in highpoint (for all the melbournians) and told them he had his copy (the first one we got) - asked them why they didn't have it yet.
they said 'what?  um... it's out?'
then proceeded to run around like mad trying to find info on it.
yeah it does seem to come down to suppliers - so what's the solution?
i might jump on a few other boards and see if i can find other cubists in australia - action really needs to be taken.