Topic: Is Nintendo really innovative?

I comes down to how exactly you define innovation.
Overall, you can reinvent the wheel just so many times. You cant just snap your fingers and turn a genre on its head.
So in my book, further incorporating walls as a gameplay element (walljumps and now climbing) into gameplay in 3D World does count as a minor innovation for the series.
So yeah, in terms of games, theres only so much you can do after so many years of gaming. You may be able to scratch a certain itch no one knew about every now and then and create a surprise hit, but targeted innovation is pretty hard at this point.

If you can make an age old genre be still as fun as it ever was, it may not be innovative, but it is something far far more important.

In terms of hardware, nintendo takes the cake every generation if you ask me. It may not be a hit every time, but it sure does get the ball rolling.

Things can be a new thing for the genre / innovative and fun - like Portal.

Every genre is capable of a similar thing. (Rodeo the Sky Soldier looks like it is that).

3D World to me is a 3D Land that isn't broken by 30fps and is never boring due to loads of new ideas. (And there is only those two that are like that). It is a better game and the best one of its type which is also ok.

What isn't ok is just more of the same. (Galaxy 2 is probably ok because the levels are slightly better and there is not the pointless story in it).

The Nintendo of today would never have even started Smash Bros / Paper Mario / Luigi's Mansion / Kirby's Air Ride they would just have done another sequel to something they already had instead. Only doing sequels is too restrictive.

Well, they're more innovative than the other two, but may not be saying too much, haha. I think their innovation mostly comes from being able to take the same idea/series and keep it good or make it better through crazy/fun ideas. People complain about Skyward Sword's controls, but I loved that they did something different and interesting. The buttons/controls will probably be forever the same for games like CoD, Halo, etc. and that's usually why I just choose a favorite in the series and then don't really keep up afterwards because it feels more like $60 DLC than anything innovative (haven't bought or played Halo since Halo 3).

Oh, and Splatoon More proof they need to pass on the mantle to the younger generation if they want to stay fresh.

I don't mind a series that's not innovative as long as it's fun. The only thing that spoils it is if the formula gets stale and repetitive.

Skyward sword is innovative.

If you want innovative software, you'll have to travel back to the early Wii days. If you want QUALITY innovative software, go to Pikmin/Animal Crossing or the Nintendo 64. If you want THE FIRST of anything visit the NES and SNES. If you want all of those things again, go to the Wii U.

To be honest I could careless about how innovative they are. I just want games to be fun. All the console makers through history have innovated in some way but in the end it's all for not if the games are not fun.

Objectively yes, but they've been pretty hit or miss because of their hardware innovation > software innovation approach.

Explain how 3D world is innovative?

I think there is still some innovation going on with all of the big 3. Everyone just always likes to pessimistic. Everybody asks for more of the same or something different, but aren't happy with either.

Well, there were games similar to Star Fox before Star Fox and there had been 3D visuals before Star Fox (just not on SNES).
And how was Super Metroid innovative when there had already been two other Metroid games before it? Oo
Plus, there had already been other games structured like Metroid even before the first Metroid.

So your examples really don't work out. Sorry.

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While I do agree that fun is the important part of the game and that Nintendo's an expert in that level, does that mean that every game Nintendo makes will mean like its really not that innovative at all after seeing Splatoon, S.T.E.A.M and let's not forget, Tomadachi Life and A link between worlds as well? All because whatever Nintendo makes isn't innovative means it won't make us get their games anymore?

Innovation is nice, but innovating often when it's not something really inclusive, a problem in the long run. Wii started out with a bang then tanked and fizzled on the back end. Virtual Boy (need to say no more.) Wii U to this point too. They tried to go with taking motion to a console, a real '3D' space, and then melding a console and a tablet. Each one, it hasn't been banner periods for the company.

The best times they had was when they were not innovating, but creating, making things fun, making NEW things not re-used things, or if they did re-use they did it to a caliber it stood on its own well as did third parties. Creation, fun creation is it, not stagnating, regurgitating, and risky innovation were proven not good things for them. Sure you could point fingers, but the NES was a 1983 famicom, the SNES had nice hardware sure, the Gamecube was a middler with older disc tech, the N64 was old cart tech and analog that Atari did in the late 70s. When they take existing stuff and work the old (maybe dead?) NIntendo magic dust on the systems and handhelds it was pure awesome, but when they went into trying to do something new, something innovating, crazy even, it backfires up front or eventually once the wow (wii) wears off.

So based on the reviews I've read about the fire emblem games, there isn't really much of innovation to them until Awakening showed up (my favorite game PERIOD!) if that is the case, then why couldn't they just make F-Zero the way it is with little to no innovation?

Now for someone who's into Nintendo, all of their games have some innovation to them but If Fire emblem was dumbstruck until Awakening, Why can't Nintendo just do the same for F-Zero instead of leaving it dormant?

Here's why:

There's little reason for Nintendo to continue the franchise. Sure, it'll satisfy some fans, but the game won't make enough money to break even, let alone make profit. The Wii U user base isn't anywhere near huge either.

Source: http://www.vgchartz.com/gamedb/?name=f-zero

The thing about wanting something different is obviously not everything is going to be perfect. (But I will still buy them and the ones that are great make it worth it even if it takes 4 games that I have still bought to get one that I think is great).

More of the same is less likely to be great or awful.

Variety (All games should strive for that instead of being 10 hours of exactly the same thing).

Captain Toad or Plessie levels nobody ever did that. (The Plessie physics are miles more enjoyable than Mario Kart).

The honeycomb overhead ones that are a bit like Ikari Warriors with the boomerang suit.

Other stuff is just well done.

i.e Proper bosses / What 3D Land would have been like if it was working properly.

It is certainly more innovative than pretty much anything else (Maybe excluding the Gamepad centric games).

@Octane that still doesn't explain why Nintendo has to make F-Zero unique when Fire emblem wasn't until now? I bet that even the sales of Fire emblem are nearly the same as F-Zero if I'm not mistaken......

They were more innovative in the 5th-late 7th gen era, but yes. Nintendo is one of the few game developers that hasn't succumbed to the crap dudebro shooter mentality that the rest of the industry suffers from. But they have succumbed to sequelitis, especially with their platformers. There's very little that Mario, DK, Yoshi, or Kirby has done in the 2010-2014 period that I could call innovative or creative.