Tomb Raider doesn't belong on Switch as it is a PC game, and PC games don't sell on Nintendo consoles. They do sell on Xbox and PlayStation as those are basically lobotomized PCs. Arcade games (or arcade-like games) sell best on Nintendo consoles, not PC games. Tomb Raider, essentially a puzzle adventure, is really a PC game.
@rushiosan I contacted Angry Mob Games last week, and they told me that they are going to be releasing an update in the near future that will make it much, much easier to unlock everything in the game. All the stages will be available from the get-go, and the gem system will be gone. They had nothing to say about adding Shovel Knight or Shantae, however, so I don't think that's going to happen.
Switch sales will eventually slow down if Nintendo doesn't get on the ball and keep releasing quality first-party games that move the hardware. Labo doesn't move hardware. Smash, as popular as it is, doesn't really move hardware either. Wii U ports are not going to do it. And for all those people saying that a slowdown in sales is cyclical or normal during this time of year, let me remind you that the Wii was sold out for 3 years straight. The reason Nintendo sales tend to be cyclical is really due to the varying quality of Nintendo's software. The truth is that Nintendo can have its hardware sold out all the time if it wants to. It simply needs to keep releasing quality software. Games like Zelda 'BoW' and Octopath are the reason most people bought a Switch in the first place, but there are no more games like these on the horizon. Also, a 2D Mario game would be great as no game sells more hardware than 2D Mario. Sadly, the developers don't want to make it (Only 3D Mario).
What I'm seeing is that Nintendo is lazy. They can make great games when they want to, but once they become successful they go into cruise control. Think about it. We were told that Nintendo having only one device to support instead of two would mean more games being released, and yet Nintendo is releasing fewer games now than ever! There can only be one reason: Laziness. Clearly, there is a lot of rot inside this company that is going to have to be removed.
Someone should ask this analyst why Nintendo would ever decide to abandon cartridges as they make a lot of money selling the cartridges to third parties. It's a huge source of revenue. Also, many people prefer to buy cartridges over digital. Many of these analysts are on the payroll of the game industry and so they push the narrative that the game industry wants. Most of the industry may want games to be 100% digital, but Nintendo and the vast majority of consumers do not. And since the consumers pay the bills, we will win.
Comparing Labo to Wii Fit and Brain Age is laughable. Those games each sold tens of millions. Labo has sold the tiniest fraction of that. And coding? Does Reggie really believe that Labo will take off with kids because they can do coding? When NOA originally tried to market the NES in the United States, they included a keyboard with it. It bombed. Kids don't want to program. They want to play games. Nintendo is an arcade gaming company. Nintendo's problem is that this is just not enough for them. They seem to want to be Apple. Finally, it is very telling that Nintendo did not announce any new Labo products at E3. If they have such big plans for Labo, why wouldn't they have new Labo stuff to show?
@NEStalgia That pricing model might work for movies and tv shows but it would never work for video games. How could publishers turn a profit on this model? There's no way. Movies and tv shows make their money from other sources besides streaming. Besides, it's pretty clear that developers have no intention of charging less for their games. It seems they're always looking to charge more whether through dlc or loot boxes.
Another prediction by an industry CEO that will no doubt fail to come true. First of all, the future of video games will be dictated by what the consumers what, not the what the industry wants. And consumers like owning hardware and they like owning physical games, partly because it gives them the option to sell the game later. And why would console companies like Nintendo ever go along with this? Nintendo makes money off of its hardware, and its hardware makes its first party software sell much more then it otherwise would. Bottom line, the only possible way that streaming ever becomes the standard is if consumers want it, but they clearly don't want it and I feel comfortable predicting that they never will.
I think an N64 mini is a bad idea for completely different reasons. The games have not aged well at all. The graphics of that era look downright ugly by today's standards. And there is not much nostalgia for the N64 as the games of that era became overly long and bloated, and the transition from 2D to 3D made games like Mario and Donkey Kong worse, not better. I've recently tried playing Mario 64 and Donkey Kong 64, and it is an absolute chore, partly due to the primitive camera, but mostly because the games suck. Nintendo developers may look back fondly at the N64 era as those games were certainly more fun for them to make, but they weren't nearly as much fun for us to play.
I find it interesting that this review says that 2D platformers are nowhere near the draw that they were in the 80s and 90s. Is this true? I don't think so. The audience never tired of 2D platformers. Only the game developers did. They simply decided they didn't want to make those games and mostly went with 3D games. Some games are better in 3D, such as racers and first-person shooters, but most games are better in 2D, yet Nintendo especially seems obsessed with making most of their games in 3D. I guess 3D games are more fun to make, but they aren't necessarily more fun to play.
@Anti-Matter I'm not angry, I just enjoy debating. And I enjoy evaluating this from a business perspective which is why I think Labo is a bad idea for Nintendo. Even if it does sell well, it's not going to move hardware, and that's the purpose of first-party games.
If Labo had great games, I'd be okay with it. But all the reviews are saying that the games are forgettable. Shouldn't the goal be to make great games that you'd want to keep playing forever? I think Nintendo is using a gimmick to cover up their laziness.
@Agent721 Yes, Labo was #1 but it also had an extraordinary amount of press and hype behind it, much more than your usual game. Let's see if the sales grow or if they go down. I suspect the hype won't push it very far beyond the first week.
@MischiefMaker Funny how Labo is supposedly for kids, and yet a big part of the supposed appeal is that you can program it to do things. But most kids don't want to program. They want to play games. That's partly why the NES succeeded and wiped the mat with PC gaming.
Programming your own fun is another kind of user generated content. These games always bomb. Remember Wii Music and what a disaster that was for Nintendo? I thought Nintendo was in the business to make money. Labo may be quirky and unique in some ways, but it sure isn't going to be making much money.
@MischiefMaker
I have no problem with Nintendo doing things differently as long as they do them better. The Wii succeeded not because it was different but because it was better. It performed the job of a game console better than the PS3 and the Xbox 360. (It was more fun.)
But in the last couple years, Nintendo has often chosen not to do things different in a better way but different in a worse way. Cardboard peripherals are different in a worse way. They go against the whole Nintendo philosophy that hardware should be durable and should last. It's just a gimmick to sell bad software and indicates that Nintendo still has a tendency to be lazy.
@MrBlacky If you love Labo, then great. But the sales numbers so far indicate that the vast majority of consumers do not feel the same. Labo has already flopped in Japan.
Labo has already flopped in Japan, only selling 30% of its inventory. For a first-party Nintendo game that has received as so much press and hype, that's terrible.
But it was very predictable if you understand why people buy products. People buy products to perform a certain job. They buy a Nintendo switch for the job of playing video games, and they buy video games to perform the job of entertainment. The actual games of Labo aren't very good, and Nintendo hasn't even done much to push the actual games. Instead, they've focused on the 'arts and crafts' aspect of Labo. But people didn't buy a Nintendo Switch to perform the job of 'arts and crafts.' They bought it to play games. And because the games aren't entertaining, it was easy to predict that Labo would flop. Because Labo doesn't perform the job that people want their games to perform.
@MischiefMaker You said Labo was designed to be 'different.' This is a mistake that Nintendo keeps making. They need to realize that they don't need to do things differently in order to succeed. They don't even need to be innovative in order to succeed. They just need to do things better than their competition. Cardboard peripherals may be different but they certainly aren't better than plastic peripherals.
It comes down to best vs. different. I'd rather play the best games rather than every goofy take on the genre. The sales history of video games suggests that most people feel the same.
@MischiefMaker You say it's not the point to have fantastic games. But why wouldn't it be the point? The Switch is a 'video game' console, is it not? And history shows that 'user-generated content' games always bomb. Besides, the purpose of first-party software is to move the hardware. And sales reports show that not only is this not happening, but that Labo has already flamed out in Japan.
@gatorboi352 Well, it seems most Nintendo first party games get good reviews from this site. Even Star Fox Zero got a good review! But Labo is going to be a bust because it's just a gimmick to sell crappy software. If these games were great, Nintendo would sell each separately with its own plastic peripheral, as that would be far more profitable. Nintendo is bundling all these games together because it knows they would never sell separately.
Could Nintendo Life please explain how Labo can get a score of 8 out of 10 when they admit in their review that Labo is a gimmick, and the games are little more than tech demos that won't hold our interest for more than a few hours? I keep reading all these glowing reviews of Labo despite the fact that the reviewers admit the games aren't particularly good. Isn't the Switch supposed to be a 'video game' console, not an 'arts and crafts' console?
FMV games aren't coming back. The problem with these games is there is virtually no replay value because the gameplay is exactly the same every single time. The mistake we see made time and time again by game developers is to believe that video games are about technology. They're not. They're about entertainment. Just because you can make an interactive movie doesn't mean you should. Just because you can make a game in 3D instead of 2D doesn't mean you should. Just because you can make a game console with superior graphics doesn't mean you should (Ask Sony about the PS3 debacle).
@UmbreonsPapa "All it takes is one of these guys to come up with a console, service or idea that, while may not give gamers every last thing they desire. But will give them just enough to jump in and quickly forget about physical media."
Such a service has already been tried. A few years ago a company called OnLive was created that was going to eliminate all hardware and physical media. You paid a monthly subscription fee and bought games, but you used the internet to stream the games from OnLive's servers. No hardware required. This business completely failed as after two years they couldn't get more than 1600 subscribers. The simple truth is that the elimination of all hardware and physical media offers no real benefits to the consumer.
@UmbreonsPapa You mention convenience and affordability in regards to digital games, but what is inconvenient about physical media? Having to travel to a store or wait for the game to be delivered by mail? Gamers have never had a problem with this. I would argue it is digital-only games that are inconvenient since you can only play the game on your own hardware. And how are digital games more affordable? Switch games cost the same whether you buy the cartridge or buy it digital.
Make no mistake, it is not some but the vast majority of gamers who want physical media. Recall the reaction to the unveiling of the Xbox One in 2013 which was originally going to be digital only. The reaction was so negative that Microsoft had to quickly backpedal and change everything. The games industry may want to go digital only but gamers don't. And since we pay the bills, we will win.
@UmbreonsPapa What Malstrom is saying is the elimination of game cartridges/discs won't happen unless the consumer wants it to happen, and the vast majority of consumers don't. They prefer physical media when it comes to games. They want to be able to buy and sell used games and take the game to a friend's house. Don't assume that games will go the same way as movies and music.
The following is from Sean Malstrom's excellent gaming blog. He explains digital distribution better than anyone else I've seen:
The entire movement behind digital distribution is being animated by game companies who are trying to create more revenue.
In a way, I hope these game companies do go digital distribution. It will destroy them. They need the used games market. They need physical games because you can’t exactly wrap a digital copy under the Christmas tree (which is why most games are bought around Christmas). With digital distribution, the “Game Industry” can kiss the children’s market good-bye forever. Children do not run around with credit cards.
If digital distribution took hold, they would not stop there. Then, you would be charged per time or number of times you play the game. You there, in the back, don’t laugh. They see the gravy train of the MMORPG and wish to replicate it for themselves. Now, the MMORPG such as WoW was due to tons of content, but game companies aren’t even interested in that.
If the “Game Industry” was healthy, then why is there so much need to increase revenue from individual games? A healthy industry should have revenue raining from above.
The “Game Industry” is in a conservation mode with trying to carve out more revenue from their existing and shrinking sales. It is like a someone trying to ration out their food instead of working to make more food.
The “Game Industry” must seek to expand and make new customers. If not, it will surely die.
With all these people talking about ‘clouds’ and digital distribution, there is another major flag that is waving that they apparently are not seeing or do not want to see. Nintendo’s success with the Wii was entirely due to the game molding side of the hardware, not the software. Only a game company would mold the hardware of the DS or the Wii and its controllers. There was also the music game fad that, ironically, the founder of RedOctane doesn’t see. Games like Rockband do not prove that digital distribution works but just the opposite. People want to have those controllers, that hardware. No doubt that the plastic guitars and all were instrumental to the music games’ success.
“But what about music and movies? What about iTunes?”
What about theater? What about concerts? What about people going to sports games? Those physical events are things people like to still go to.
“This is different! I am talking about entertainment and the marvelous trends that the Internet is causing! Digital Distribution, yay!”
You are not talking about entertainment. You are cherry picking. You are taking the entertainment mediums that fit the vision you like while excluding all the other entertainment mediums that are not fitting your digital utopia.
What no one is doing is using gaming as the benchmark. They are using other industries as if that proves the point. The belief that all things entertainment must and will go ‘cloud’ is poppycock. There is no destiny, no grand divine push by history. What will shape the future will be whatever customers want.
Music and movies were never hardware dependent. Music and movies are recordings that are played back on “players”. Games are not recordings. Games are ‘broadcast live’ from the hardware. The hardware is not a digital beam of electrons that channels the game into the TV, it is the instrument of the game.
When a movie or music player changes, the movie or music does not fundamentally change. It might play on five speakers instead of two. It might be widescreen when it wasn’t before. But “Star Wars” is still going to be fundamentally “Star Wars” no matter if it is on video cassette, DVD, or digitally distributed.
But video games do change with the hardware. In fact, they change radically. And when games are taken off the hardware and placed on another hardware, the experience is never quite the same.
Let’s not forget that the music and movie industries were dragged into digital distribution kicking and screaming by consumers. They didn’t want to go. They saw themselves as losing money.
The trend is not digital distribution. The trend is customers going the way industries don’t want to go. And the trend the console game consumers will go is toward hardware. PC gamers may be happy in the ‘cloud’, and that is fine because it will differentiate the PC and console as they have been wrongly blurred together recently.
It is time to use the benchmark of gaming as… gaming. Not music. Not movies. But gaming. There has been decades of gaming. Certainly, one can detect some patterns. And one of the biggest patterns there are is that console gaming is all about hardware. If it weren’t, people would just play computers hooked up to their television sets.
Here is what is going to happen. Ten years from now, people are going to look up this post. And they are going to ask, “How did this guy get it when the wizards of smart in the ‘Game Industry’ didn’t get it?” The answer is not because I am smart. The answer is because the past is prelude to the future. It is incredible that the future of gaming is always presented as the present of another entertainment medium. No, gaming’s future will not be the future of music or movies.
Comments 78
Re: Tomb Raider Won’t Be Making The Switch Anytime Soon, According To Eidos Montreal
Tomb Raider doesn't belong on Switch as it is a PC game, and PC games don't sell on Nintendo consoles. They do sell on Xbox and PlayStation as those are basically lobotomized PCs. Arcade games (or arcade-like games) sell best on Nintendo consoles, not PC games. Tomb Raider, essentially a puzzle adventure, is really a PC game.
Re: Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Will Feature 3v3, 5v5 And Smashdown Multiplayer Modes
Can we have up to 8 players local like in the Wii U version?
Re: Hard-Hitting Hero From Dead Cells Revealed As New Fighter For Brawlout
@rushiosan
I contacted Angry Mob Games last week, and they told me that they are going to be releasing an update in the near future that will make it much, much easier to unlock everything in the game. All the stages will be available from the get-go, and the gem system will be gone. They had nothing to say about adding Shovel Knight or Shantae, however, so I don't think that's going to happen.
Re: Wall Street Analyst Warns Of Slowing Nintendo Switch Sales
Switch sales will eventually slow down if Nintendo doesn't get on the ball and keep releasing quality first-party games that move the hardware. Labo doesn't move hardware. Smash, as popular as it is, doesn't really move hardware either. Wii U ports are not going to do it. And for all those people saying that a slowdown in sales is cyclical or normal during this time of year, let me remind you that the Wii was sold out for 3 years straight. The reason Nintendo sales tend to be cyclical is really due to the varying quality of Nintendo's software. The truth is that Nintendo can have its hardware sold out all the time if it wants to. It simply needs to keep releasing quality software. Games like Zelda 'BoW' and Octopath are the reason most people bought a Switch in the first place, but there are no more games like these on the horizon. Also, a 2D Mario game would be great as no game sells more hardware than 2D Mario. Sadly, the developers don't want to make it (Only 3D Mario).
What I'm seeing is that Nintendo is lazy. They can make great games when they want to, but once they become successful they go into cruise control. Think about it. We were told that Nintendo having only one device to support instead of two would mean more games being released, and yet Nintendo is releasing fewer games now than ever! There can only be one reason: Laziness. Clearly, there is a lot of rot inside this company that is going to have to be removed.
Re: US Research Analyst Believes Gaming Could Become 100% Digital By 2022
Someone should ask this analyst why Nintendo would ever decide to abandon cartridges as they make a lot of money selling the cartridges to third parties. It's a huge source of revenue. Also, many people prefer to buy cartridges over digital. Many of these analysts are on the payroll of the game industry and so they push the narrative that the game industry wants. Most of the industry may want games to be 100% digital, but Nintendo and the vast majority of consumers do not. And since the consumers pay the bills, we will win.
Re: Reggie Fils-Aimé Says Nintendo Labo Has “Absolutely” Met Company Expectations
Comparing Labo to Wii Fit and Brain Age is laughable. Those games each sold tens of millions. Labo has sold the tiniest fraction of that. And coding? Does Reggie really believe that Labo will take off with kids because they can do coding? When NOA originally tried to market the NES in the United States, they included a keyboard with it. It bombed. Kids don't want to program. They want to play games. Nintendo is an arcade gaming company. Nintendo's problem is that this is just not enough for them. They seem to want to be Apple. Finally, it is very telling that Nintendo did not announce any new Labo products at E3. If they have such big plans for Labo, why wouldn't they have new Labo stuff to show?
Re: Ubisoft CEO Believes The Next Generation Of Consoles Will Be The Last
@NEStalgia That pricing model might work for movies and tv shows but it would never work for video games. How could publishers turn a profit on this model? There's no way. Movies and tv shows make their money from other sources besides streaming. Besides, it's pretty clear that developers have no intention of charging less for their games. It seems they're always looking to charge more whether through dlc or loot boxes.
Re: Ubisoft CEO Believes The Next Generation Of Consoles Will Be The Last
Another prediction by an industry CEO that will no doubt fail to come true. First of all, the future of video games will be dictated by what the consumers what, not the what the industry wants. And consumers like owning hardware and they like owning physical games, partly because it gives them the option to sell the game later. And why would console companies like Nintendo ever go along with this? Nintendo makes money off of its hardware, and its hardware makes its first party software sell much more then it otherwise would. Bottom line, the only possible way that streaming ever becomes the standard is if consumers want it, but they clearly don't want it and I feel comfortable predicting that they never will.
Re: Soapbox: Why A Nintendo 64 Classic Edition Might Not Be Such A Good Idea
I think an N64 mini is a bad idea for completely different reasons. The games have not aged well at all. The graphics of that era look downright ugly by today's standards. And there is not much nostalgia for the N64 as the games of that era became overly long and bloated, and the transition from 2D to 3D made games like Mario and Donkey Kong worse, not better. I've recently tried playing Mario 64 and Donkey Kong 64, and it is an absolute chore, partly due to the primitive camera, but mostly because the games suck. Nintendo developers may look back fondly at the N64 era as those games were certainly more fun for them to make, but they weren't nearly as much fun for us to play.
Re: Review: Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze (Switch)
I find it interesting that this review says that 2D platformers are nowhere near the draw that they were in the 80s and 90s. Is this true? I don't think so. The audience never tired of 2D platformers. Only the game developers did. They simply decided they didn't want to make those games and mostly went with 3D games. Some games are better in 3D, such as racers and first-person shooters, but most games are better in 2D, yet Nintendo especially seems obsessed with making most of their games in 3D. I guess 3D games are more fun to make, but they aren't necessarily more fun to play.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@Anti-Matter
I'm not angry, I just enjoy debating. And I enjoy evaluating this from a business perspective which is why I think Labo is a bad idea for Nintendo. Even if it does sell well, it's not going to move hardware, and that's the purpose of first-party games.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@Anti-Matter
If Labo had great games, I'd be okay with it. But all the reviews are saying that the games are forgettable. Shouldn't the goal be to make great games that you'd want to keep playing forever? I think Nintendo is using a gimmick to cover up their laziness.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@Agent721
Yes, Labo was #1 but it also had an extraordinary amount of press and hype behind it, much more than your usual game. Let's see if the sales grow or if they go down. I suspect the hype won't push it very far beyond the first week.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@MischiefMaker
Funny how Labo is supposedly for kids, and yet a big part of the supposed appeal is that you can program it to do things. But most kids don't want to program. They want to play games. That's partly why the NES succeeded and wiped the mat with PC gaming.
Programming your own fun is another kind of user generated content. These games always bomb. Remember Wii Music and what a disaster that was for Nintendo? I thought Nintendo was in the business to make money. Labo may be quirky and unique in some ways, but it sure isn't going to be making much money.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@MischiefMaker
I have no problem with Nintendo doing things differently as long as they do them better. The Wii succeeded not because it was different but because it was better. It performed the job of a game console better than the PS3 and the Xbox 360. (It was more fun.)
But in the last couple years, Nintendo has often chosen not to do things different in a better way but different in a worse way. Cardboard peripherals are different in a worse way. They go against the whole Nintendo philosophy that hardware should be durable and should last. It's just a gimmick to sell bad software and indicates that Nintendo still has a tendency to be lazy.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@MrBlacky
If you love Labo, then great. But the sales numbers so far indicate that the vast majority of consumers do not feel the same. Labo has already flopped in Japan.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
Labo has already flopped in Japan, only selling 30% of its inventory. For a first-party Nintendo game that has received as so much press and hype, that's terrible.
But it was very predictable if you understand why people buy products. People buy products to perform a certain job. They buy a Nintendo switch for the job of playing video games, and they buy video games to perform the job of entertainment. The actual games of Labo aren't very good, and Nintendo hasn't even done much to push the actual games. Instead, they've focused on the 'arts and crafts' aspect of Labo. But people didn't buy a Nintendo Switch to perform the job of 'arts and crafts.' They bought it to play games. And because the games aren't entertaining, it was easy to predict that Labo would flop. Because Labo doesn't perform the job that people want their games to perform.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@MischiefMaker You said Labo was designed to be 'different.' This is a mistake that Nintendo keeps making. They need to realize that they don't need to do things differently in order to succeed. They don't even need to be innovative in order to succeed. They just need to do things better than their competition. Cardboard peripherals may be different but they certainly aren't better than plastic peripherals.
It comes down to best vs. different. I'd rather play the best games rather than every goofy take on the genre. The sales history of video games suggests that most people feel the same.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@MischiefMaker You say it's not the point to have fantastic games. But why wouldn't it be the point? The Switch is a 'video game' console, is it not? And history shows that 'user-generated content' games always bomb. Besides, the purpose of first-party software is to move the hardware. And sales reports show that not only is this not happening, but that Labo has already flamed out in Japan.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@gatorboi352 Well, it seems most Nintendo first party games get good reviews from this site. Even Star Fox Zero got a good review! But Labo is going to be a bust because it's just a gimmick to sell crappy software. If these games were great, Nintendo would sell each separately with its own plastic peripheral, as that would be far more profitable. Nintendo is bundling all these games together because it knows they would never sell separately.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
@MrBlacky If a game only has a couple hours of gameplay in it then I don't think it deserves an 8 out of 10 score.
Re: Review: Nintendo Labo: Toy-Con 01 - Variety Kit (Switch)
Could Nintendo Life please explain how Labo can get a score of 8 out of 10 when they admit in their review that Labo is a gimmick, and the games are little more than tech demos that won't hold our interest for more than a few hours? I keep reading all these glowing reviews of Labo despite the fact that the reviewers admit the games aren't particularly good. Isn't the Switch supposed to be a 'video game' console, not an 'arts and crafts' console?
Re: Feature: The Making Of Night Trap, The World's Most Famous Video Game Nasty
FMV games aren't coming back. The problem with these games is there is virtually no replay value because the gameplay is exactly the same every single time. The mistake we see made time and time again by game developers is to believe that video games are about technology. They're not. They're about entertainment. Just because you can make an interactive movie doesn't mean you should. Just because you can make a game in 3D instead of 2D doesn't mean you should. Just because you can make a game console with superior graphics doesn't mean you should (Ask Sony about the PS3 debacle).
Re: Random: We Have Our First Nintendo Labo Knock-Off
This actually looks pretty cool. I'd be more likely to buy this than any of the other Labo garbage.
Re: Soapbox: I'm Secretly Terrified Of An All-Digital Gaming Future
@UmbreonsPapa "All it takes is one of these guys to come up with a console, service or idea that, while may not give gamers every last thing they desire. But will give them just enough to jump in and quickly forget about physical media."
Such a service has already been tried. A few years ago a company called OnLive was created that was going to eliminate all hardware and physical media. You paid a monthly subscription fee and bought games, but you used the internet to stream the games from OnLive's servers. No hardware required. This business completely failed as after two years they couldn't get more than 1600 subscribers. The simple truth is that the elimination of all hardware and physical media offers no real benefits to the consumer.
Re: Soapbox: I'm Secretly Terrified Of An All-Digital Gaming Future
@UmbreonsPapa You mention convenience and affordability in regards to digital games, but what is inconvenient about physical media? Having to travel to a store or wait for the game to be delivered by mail? Gamers have never had a problem with this. I would argue it is digital-only games that are inconvenient since you can only play the game on your own hardware. And how are digital games more affordable? Switch games cost the same whether you buy the cartridge or buy it digital.
Make no mistake, it is not some but the vast majority of gamers who want physical media. Recall the reaction to the unveiling of the Xbox One in 2013 which was originally going to be digital only. The reaction was so negative that Microsoft had to quickly backpedal and change everything. The games industry may want to go digital only but gamers don't. And since we pay the bills, we will win.
Re: Soapbox: I'm Secretly Terrified Of An All-Digital Gaming Future
@UmbreonsPapa What Malstrom is saying is the elimination of game cartridges/discs won't happen unless the consumer wants it to happen, and the vast majority of consumers don't. They prefer physical media when it comes to games. They want to be able to buy and sell used games and take the game to a friend's house. Don't assume that games will go the same way as movies and music.
Re: Soapbox: I'm Secretly Terrified Of An All-Digital Gaming Future
The following is from Sean Malstrom's excellent gaming blog. He explains digital distribution better than anyone else I've seen:
The entire movement behind digital distribution is being animated by game companies who are trying to create more revenue.
In a way, I hope these game companies do go digital distribution. It will destroy them. They need the used games market. They need physical games because you can’t exactly wrap a digital copy under the Christmas tree (which is why most games are bought around Christmas). With digital distribution, the “Game Industry” can kiss the children’s market good-bye forever. Children do not run around with credit cards.
If digital distribution took hold, they would not stop there. Then, you would be charged per time or number of times you play the game. You there, in the back, don’t laugh. They see the gravy train of the MMORPG and wish to replicate it for themselves. Now, the MMORPG such as WoW was due to tons of content, but game companies aren’t even interested in that.
If the “Game Industry” was healthy, then why is there so much need to increase revenue from individual games? A healthy industry should have revenue raining from above.
The “Game Industry” is in a conservation mode with trying to carve out more revenue from their existing and shrinking sales. It is like a someone trying to ration out their food instead of working to make more food.
The “Game Industry” must seek to expand and make new customers. If not, it will surely die.
With all these people talking about ‘clouds’ and digital distribution, there is another major flag that is waving that they apparently are not seeing or do not want to see. Nintendo’s success with the Wii was entirely due to the game molding side of the hardware, not the software. Only a game company would mold the hardware of the DS or the Wii and its controllers. There was also the music game fad that, ironically, the founder of RedOctane doesn’t see. Games like Rockband do not prove that digital distribution works but just the opposite. People want to have those controllers, that hardware. No doubt that the plastic guitars and all were instrumental to the music games’ success.
“But what about music and movies? What about iTunes?”
What about theater? What about concerts? What about people going to sports games? Those physical events are things people like to still go to.
“This is different! I am talking about entertainment and the marvelous trends that the Internet is causing! Digital Distribution, yay!”
You are not talking about entertainment. You are cherry picking. You are taking the entertainment mediums that fit the vision you like while excluding all the other entertainment mediums that are not fitting your digital utopia.
What no one is doing is using gaming as the benchmark. They are using other industries as if that proves the point. The belief that all things entertainment must and will go ‘cloud’ is poppycock. There is no destiny, no grand divine push by history. What will shape the future will be whatever customers want.
Music and movies were never hardware dependent. Music and movies are recordings that are played back on “players”. Games are not recordings. Games are ‘broadcast live’ from the hardware. The hardware is not a digital beam of electrons that channels the game into the TV, it is the instrument of the game.
When a movie or music player changes, the movie or music does not fundamentally change. It might play on five speakers instead of two. It might be widescreen when it wasn’t before. But “Star Wars” is still going to be fundamentally “Star Wars” no matter if it is on video cassette, DVD, or digitally distributed.
But video games do change with the hardware. In fact, they change radically. And when games are taken off the hardware and placed on another hardware, the experience is never quite the same.
Let’s not forget that the music and movie industries were dragged into digital distribution kicking and screaming by consumers. They didn’t want to go. They saw themselves as losing money.
The trend is not digital distribution. The trend is customers going the way industries don’t want to go. And the trend the console game consumers will go is toward hardware. PC gamers may be happy in the ‘cloud’, and that is fine because it will differentiate the PC and console as they have been wrongly blurred together recently.
It is time to use the benchmark of gaming as… gaming. Not music. Not movies. But gaming. There has been decades of gaming. Certainly, one can detect some patterns. And one of the biggest patterns there are is that console gaming is all about hardware. If it weren’t, people would just play computers hooked up to their television sets.
Here is what is going to happen. Ten years from now, people are going to look up this post. And they are going to ask, “How did this guy get it when the wizards of smart in the ‘Game Industry’ didn’t get it?” The answer is not because I am smart. The answer is because the past is prelude to the future. It is incredible that the future of gaming is always presented as the present of another entertainment medium. No, gaming’s future will not be the future of music or movies.