Topic: Nintendo is a victim of it's own influence

I was thinking recently about how Nintendo has many dormant franchises. I was thinking of ways they can be brought into this new generation of systems, and something hit me. A lot of Nintendo's properties were created in simpler times and had simpler gameplay. They were extremely influential, and others developers took those ideas and expanded upon them time after time after time, sometimes worse than the original product, sometimes just as good, and in rare cases, even better. But what happened is, more and more games featured what made the original game stand out, plus more. So what happens now is when we say "Make a new _________", from a development standpoint, well, what exactly is that game, other than the name?

Looking at a very simple example, and one I don't really hear being called for new games very often, but it's an easy game to use in this situation: Ice Climbers. I don't remember much about the game, but it pretty simply was to keep jumping up and not falling down and dying. Obviously, that just doesn't cut it nowadays. So if someone says "It'd be great to get a new Ice Climbers", Nintendo pretty much has to create an entirely new game with all new mechanics and just call it Ice Climbers, but they get basically nothing to start with or build off of.

When other companies take the central basis of your game and expand upon it for years, it becomes really hard, and in most cases pointless, to go back and recreate those games or build sequels, other than the Brand Power of the name, of course.

One series I think is awesome and unique enough to get another sequel is the Nintendo Wars series, Advance Wars on GBA and Batallion Wars on Gamecube. I think that series would be great on the Wii U with the Gamepad, but I think many of Nintendo's dormant franchises are like that for a reason.

I think F-Zero is in this boat as well, that's why it's the only one of Nintendo's biggest dormant IPs that we have absolutely no idea if it's returning (Metroid is still not confirmed, but at least we have an interview that claims it's in the works, so I expect them to release one by the end of this gen). What is there really do to with a futuristic car racing games that can't be done in other racers? It doesn't seem like there was ever a unique gameplay mechanic to begin with, a lot of what they've done can simply be done in Mario Kart, and I can't think of any direction for it to go in that would make it unique.

F-Zero is a Racing game.

Mario Kart is a Party game.

I think that Nintendo are limiting themselves creatively by ignore the old ip's. Even if they want to drop the old one's, they're not exactly filling the space with new one's that people really get excited for.
I've always been a bit puzzled why Nintendo have so many 2nd party dev's that really don't seem to be doing much. Donkey Kong Country was a huge succes on the Wii, Punch Out Wii was critically well received, even Kid Icarus 3DS was a hit. So, why aren't Nintendo getting their external dev's working on the older ip's if they can't make them internaly.

F-Zero doesn't NEED to be unique. It just needs to be F-Zero.
Insanely fast racing, very difficult challenges and tons of racers!
Add online to that, better graphics and a new soundtrack.. I think most F-Zero fans would be happy with that.

Mario Kart? Mario Kart and F- Zero are apples and oranges. You can't just do anything you would do in F-Zero and do it in Mario Kart and vice versa. It would come out completely different with the same concept. I'm inclined to believe you've never played F-Zero right now. Unique also doesn't mean it has a gameplay gimmick, it can just be feel and flow of the game. For example, Uncharted isn't unique because of a gimmick, it's unique because of it's cinimatic style and flavor. There's no clear gameplay mechanic to set it apart, nor does there need to be.

Ice Climbers was never good. I don't know why anyone wants them to make another game

The thing is, that's not how Nintendo works. They are more likely to throw stuff at the wall with generic character and then a bit of it goes into Zelda, a bit goes into Mario. If they come up with something huge? Maybe that becomes a new IP. I don't think they're that restricted by their IPs at all. If they were we wouldn't have seen games like Super Mario Galaxy, Animal Crossing and Pikmin.

#HDRemakeOfIceClimbers

Nintendo have a slight problem that has come since they pretty much made all the genre defining games for 4 or 5 console generations. Sony and MS saw what was popular, ran with it and have improved upon existing ideas to the point where Nintendo barely try to compete in the shooter and open-world action game market. Nintendo tried something very different (motion controls and DS) which resulted in unprecedented success, followed by unprecedented complacency and some of the lowest standards of first party software I have ever played from them.

Nintendo's 'biggest dormant IP' are dormant because they didn't make enough money last time and because paying customers bought truckloads of Mario instead. Nintendo had their fingers burnt with creativity and new IP in the GC generation and did brilliantly with rehashes in the Wii generation. Hopefully the Wii U's problems will encourage Nintendo to be a bit more daring with their next console and not to just try to live off the back of the previous generation's successes.

I love F-Zero but it has become the new hipster claim as the franchise that would 'bring them back to Nintendo'. I don't understand where all these fans were when either of the last games came out. For me, Nintendo only need to remake F-Zero GX with online, a few extra tracks (maybe from X) and a better tutorial for essential techniques like snaking. Same with every other dormant racing franchise they have at the moment.

@WaLzgi I never played it, but I'd like to see it. I like the concept of the game. And- admittedly, largely because of Smash (although I could say the same for CFalcon)- I like Popo and Nana as characters. They're adorable.
I think I'd prefer an Uprising-style reboot, though, and I've heard this idea a few times: a 2D platformer with more focus on going vertically or more focus on combat, where you'd need to have both Pop and Nana or split them up for certain puzzles. I'd buy that.

_{I want a Balloon Fight remake/reboot, too...}

Being designed to be non-competitive doesn't make it not a racing game. And even if that was true, they could make it optional by toggling items.

Yeah, all 100 of them. That's the other part of the equation for F-Zero, it stopped selling. Why would they bring something back that didn't sell and had no redeeming quality that made the gameplay unique? There's just no benefit to doing so.

Gameplay mechanics are a huge part of what makes a gameplay unique. What kinds of actions and moves you can perform. How you accomplish a particular task. The things that you actually do in the game. Those are the most defining aspects of the game. I can replicate feel and flow in other games, and aesthetics only really matter when they lead to new gameplay mechanics, otherwise it mainly only affects graphics, which are the most artificial part of a video game. But I can't always replicate a gameplay mechanic because it may not always benefit the gameplay or make sense for the franchise.

What do you mean "no redeeming qualities". There is no other racing-game like F-Zero. Are there other futuristic racers? Sure.
But they don't feel even close to the same as F-Zero does.

You didn't read what I said. Feel isn't really significant, gameplay mechanics are the biggest defining aspect of a game.

I agree with @Bolt_Strike , as I think he is realizing what I meant when I made the thread.

There are lots of racing games, and do any of them "feel" and "flow" like F Zero? Probably not (I'm not a huge racing fan). Forza, Need for Speed, whatever other big ones are out there, in most ways probably do not at all play like F-Zero. But, here's the thing. When F-Zero first came out, video games were very cartoony, especially a lot of racers. Many had a silly, goofy, cartoony feel. F-Zero stood out by being "realistic", "futuristic", "edgy", etc. (It was cartoony in it's own way, as well). It really was a different experience from what was out there in every way by being "realer" and "cooler" than the other experiences.

But racing games nowadays provide plenty of realness, coolness, edginess- Much more so than what F-Zero ever did in most respects. So it's really lost that edge. It doesn't matter that Forza is real cars and F-Zero is futuristic ones, really. It still negates what really made it stand out. IMO, of course.

If you're going to remake a game VS making a brand new title, there are really only a couple reasons to do so:

1- That franchise has super unique mechanic(s) that fit it very well and either aren't found elsewhere at all, or to the same degree of quality and balance.
2- The franchise is just such a big name that it's going to sell even if the game isn't made very well.

So if something like Ice Climbers, F Zero, Excitebike, Wave Race, 1080 offers neither, why go and remake them? To silence the vocal minority? It just doesn't make sense.

Well I got Race the Sun in the last Humble Bundle. So that's my F-Zero and Starfox fix for a bit

Mario Kart is just as difficult to be the best at as F-Zero. The difference with MK is there are far more people interested in playing so there's a greater level of competition, there's also no good items for the person in first so to actually retain a lead against blue and red shells is not as easy just being the fastest. If F-Zero was online, people would complain that they were winning all race and got taken out by someone they were lapping and then call it a game based around luck.

F-Zero is a different sort of racing game. It was more skilled based with a sharp difficulty curve. You had tracks with insane turns with insane high speeds. You couldn't bump other racers without damage and there were no powerups. It is advantageous to stake out a huge lead and hang on to it, because it is difficult for someone to regain lost ground. That makes it more niche because only the hardcore is going to be really good at it, and there is a unfortunately not a large enough hardcore fanbase to take the risk regularly. Even the last F-Zero that came out did so largely as a tie-in to a competitive arcade racer in Japan.

Mario Kart is designed to make everyone feel like they have a chance to win or at least effect the outcome of the race. It is designed to keep someone from falling too far behind or getting too far ahead, because both of those situations are boring for the player. That is why the Blue Shell, Bullet Bill and other big powerups end up in the hands of the bottom of the pack, and also why the top of the pack end up with Coins a lot. It works hard to make sure everyone feels like they have a chance to improve where they are or risk falling behind someone else. That makes it a lot more accessible.

In Mario Kart, you make a mistake, and you can easily recover. From what I remember on F-Zero X, you made one mistake, you lost the race (or at least lost any chance at first place). In a sense, any game when you're just playing multiplayer (that's well designed) is hard to be the best at, because you're playing with people. Mario Kart is designed to be played by just about anyone, F-Zero demands skill and precision from the start. It has a higher bar of entry. If you take out trying to be a multiplayer pro, F-Zero is a much harder game to be good at. It's like comparing being good at Dark Souls and COD.

Considering that the arcade racer has been dead and supplanted by driving simulators, I'd say there is a lot F-zero can do.