Why do I defend Nintendo?
Friday, August 24th, 2007 at 9:55am by Jack
Writing on the Internet is a tricky trade. Just here on Infendo alone I’ve been called all manner of vile things that go bump in the night by both the well-informed and the insipidly ignorant and stupid.
At the same time, however, I’ve also received my fair share of compliments and I’ve had the truly awesome opportunity of engaging in respectful, thought provoking conversations with people who cared enough to comment even though we’ll probably never meet face-to-face (well, unless Blake can string together some kind of PAX-esque Infendo conference. We’ll see, right?).
Now, with one year under my belt with Infendo — not that anyone cares about such anniversaries here — I thought I’d try to explain why I’ve chosen Nintendo as my standard of sorts, and why at times I can appear so biased in favor of the house that Miyamoto, Yamauchi and Mario built.
First off, it’s important to note that in the late 1990’s, following a disappointing experience with my Nintendo 64, I gave up on Nintendo. I can say with much regret that the only game I ever purchased for that system was Super Mario 64. I made a few rentals here and there — Wave Race 64 and Golden Eye come to mind — but I never really connected with the N64. To top it all off, I never beat Mario 64. I still haven’t to this day.
It was the last Nintendo console system I owned.
Did I have other systems in the apartments I’ve had since then? Sure I did. I had several roommates over the years that were far more hardcore than I was when it came to console and PC gaming, so I was lucky enough to experience everything from Team Fortress and Half Life to Ghost Recon on XBox to Tiger Woods Golf on a PS2 that my sister let me have when she won it at an after prom party. But ever since that sour experience with my N64 I was never really into gaming anymore.
Oh, and there was the fact that I sold several of my used NES titles to buy a Playstation just so I could play Final Fantasy 7. RC Pro-Am was forever lost to the clutches of some seedy Massachusetts haggler. Sacrilege for a Nintendo fanman? Indubitably, but I think it says volumes about how I felt about Nintendo’s direction and what little respect I had for the company at the time. I still don’t think I’ve yet recovered to 100%, and I pray that Shigeru Miyamoto does not frequent this blog for fear he might smite me with some wild, wacky new Pokemon.
But even as I was wooed by the 3D graphics presented by Sony’s initial effort into console gaming, and by the intricate stories found in the two other Final Fantasy titles I purchased for the system, I noticed something. I was playing games less and less each year. I was playing only one type of game (I also experimented a tad with Parasite Eve and Colony Wars). In fact, I started to notice that with the rise of FMV not only was I playing games less as a whole, but when I was playing them I wasn’t technically playing them, you know? They were playing me. The cut scene had become the selling point for games and we gamers were merely the observers. Part of that attitude, I’m sure, was simply because I was growing up. Retrospectively though, I think part of it was that these New Age games were taking themselves way too seriously.
But then something weird happened. And no, it wasn’t puberty. I was home from college and started rummaging through a closet on a weird nostalgia-induced rampage and I discovered my old NES. It was missing the cartridge slot flap — the victim of a controller thrown in anger many years ago — but it otherwise worked 100%. I hooked it up to the basement TV and I started playing. First, Super C; then Mario Bros; then Battletoads; then Life Force. I was just finishing Life Force for about the third time when I realized how late in the day it had become. So I took a break. And then I hooked up my SNES and started all over again. Actraiser. Final Fantasy 2. Chrono Trigger. Hell, even that debacle DOOM got a play before the pixelated mess on my TV screen set me to the bathroom to hurl.
None of the 8-bit NES games were graphical masterpieces, but they got the job done (well, except maybe Battletoads. Pause music, anyone?). I had become immersed in dated technology by means of a sharp-edged, rectangular controller with only two buttons! Imagine that!
Fast forward a bit. When Nintendo came back with a vengeance in 2005 promising to change the way gaming was played forever, I made the choice to believe them first, and ask questions later. If they didn’t come through as advertised, however, I would officially be through with them. Most of the community, I imagine, was with me on that one. The press, as is obvious to anyone with an Internet connection, had already written off Nintendo and was preparing sharpened stakes to finish the job. Instead of helping them, I decided to help Nintendo. I was going to purchase this system, no matter the price point, and I was going to get back into gaming. I didn’t even know what the thing looked like yet.
Then this little white thing popped up on stage and everyone shut the hell up. There was confusion. There was excitement. There were rumors and rampant speculation. Now I could see the system I was going to purchase in November 2006, and its wacky Wiimote as well. To call the Wii a beacon is perhaps a bit too grandiose, but five years (or less) from now you might find that description is actually an understatement.
The Wii message was brilliant in its simplicity because, well, the product they were selling was a masterful blend of the mundanely simple and the fiendishly complex. If you’ve ever read Sun Tzu’s the Art of War, you knew immediately that a little system like the Wii was going to topple the Playstation empire. It was logic at its finest. You have two powerful enemies at your gates, with enough firepower (read: money) to flatten your city ten times over. Do you fight them head on? Do you open the gates and begin a war? Or do you use your enemies strengths against them?
To engage a stronger enemy head on is suicide. It is not honorable. Instead, Nintendo used its head. It took those powerful specs and processing speeds and storage sizes and made them irrelevant. It found the back door that exists in every business, just as it does in every castle ever conceived in a Final Fantasy series, and blew off the hinges. It took a risk, and decided that the biggest vacuums that existed in gaming were price and immersion. People were paying too much money for too little of an experience. I agreed with them.
Today people attack Nintendo for appealing “only the casual gamer.” They act as if Nintendo has forgotten about the hardcore gamers on which the industry today is based. But that’s what I call Old World thinking. It’s the kind of thinking of a person who is used to the old model, the one where the entire industry focused only on one type of person at any given time. It’s the kind of thinking that makes me see that the narrow minded focus of gaming today can only see the market in terms of segments and labels; Of hardcore gamers and casual ones. It makes me think that the big time players in the industry today are too slow and behemoth-like to see that a company can focus on all segments at once. It’s the kind of thinking that will no longer exist in three years.
Nintendo doesn’t just care about grandmas and women now because that would not be sustainable, much like appealing only to hardcore gamers has resulted in a shrinking industry that does not have the respect of a majority of people around the world. Even today, if you were to ask a stranger about video games, what do you think they would say in return? Do you think they’d offer up a response about Grand Theft Auto? Or killing things? Or something with guns? I do.
I’m by no means against any of those themes (Ghost Recon lover here, remember?), but when they start framing an industry I love and support then something needs to change. It has to change, because right now there are dozens of lawmakers who are trying to regulate the gaming industry because they are judging the only part of it that makes it to the surface: violence. There is so much more to gaming that that, obviously, but I’m afraid that over the past few years we gamers have become defined by the vocal minority. How unfortunate.
But change has started. Slowly at first, but month over month that slope gets steeper.
Ever since the launch of the DS and the Wii … my my my, look at those quarterly profits grow and grow. I think GameStop lined all their corporate restroom toilets in gold last month. And it wasn’t just Nintendo posting record growth, it was the developers too — and not just the ones making Nintendo games! Aside from Nintendo, is the industry doing anything truly different than it was a year or two ago? Not really. It’s flashier, yes. And more expensive to buy into, but it hasn’t fundamentally changed in about 10 years. The only big difference in strategy has been Nintendo. A rising tide raises all boats and Nintendo’s success, while great for Nintendo, has been arguably great for the industry as a whole.
That change will also include how we read about our industry.
Just look how games are sold and marketed to us today. We are shown cut scenes and video and we are asked to just shut up and trust that the game will be the game of the year no questions asked. We are told what we’ll need to have a good time with our game console, instead of being shown a game and allowed to decide for ourselves. No one takes us seriously outside of the gaming community and therefore publishers and hardware manufacturers run little risk if they mess up or piss anyone off. The press, which literally exists to find the truth, is instead an elite gentleman’s club where skill of prose and investigative skills take a back seat to swag bags from conference shows. When there is no accountability any given system will become complacent. Lazy. Arrogant. They are dazzled by graphics and huge marketing pushes, and only after the game has been on the shelves for a week do we start to see any semblance of objectivity — usually provided by the angry gamers themselves.
So why do I “defend” Nintendo, and why does it appear that I do it so blindly all the time? It’s not that I hate Sony, or Microsoft or violent games, because I don’t. But I do hate apathy and arrogance. When Sony lashes out at Nintendo for A, or Microsoft for B, or whoever else for C, and then TELLS me what it knows is going to be good for me as a gamer, I don’t see progress. I see 2004. When Sony — or anyone else for that matter — criticizes the Wiimote for being a gimmick, I see ignorance. It’s ignorant because the entire Wii package (and DS) is brand new. It has the potential to foster new ideas and create new avenues leading to complete unknowns. To criticize that is tantamount to encouraging failure. Sure, you might win a few battles at the onset with that kind of thinking, but over time you’re ultimately doomed.
I support Nintendo because past, present and future I believe it holds the greatest chance of growing this industry in ALL segments. Therefore I believe it represents the best chance that I’ll be playing video games in 5, 10, even 20 years.
But let’s get cyclical, shall we?
In a really, really corny sense, my TV stand today is like a tapestry. The NES sits front and center as it should be and to its lower right sits an SNES, its gray plastic stained yellow with age. Next to that, an N64, now holding Ocarina of Time. Up top, perched on a speaker for all to see when they first enter the room, is the white veneer of the Wii. In a basket to their right, mixed in among a few Wiimotes and a classic controller, is a DS Lite. Missing, and never purchased, is the GameCube. Like I said, it’s the stages of my life, Nintendo style. DO I miss not having owned a GameCube? I do, but I can’t take back what I felt about Nintendo at the time. Looking back, I’m actually kind of glad I never bought it, in a weird kind of way.
I was six when I got that NES for Xmas, so in large part it helped shape me. It’s more than 20 years old, and works just as well as the day I got it. Sure I played sports and had friends and all that, but some of of my nostalgic memories involve going to a friend’s house to play an NES game that I didn’t own, and to trade some of my own games and just “play some Nintendo.” Oh, and throw an indestructible controller or two.
Some people get passionate about sports teams, others about politics or television shows and movies. As for me, I chose Nintendo (ok ok, and the Red Sox too). I see that company, with a multitude of new ideas and the refinement of old ones, as the best chance of continuing gaming into the future. For everyone. And what’s the best part about that future being shaped by Nintendo? Simple. We have no idea whats coming next, and that’s a great thing indeed.
While I wait for that to happen though, maybe I’ll go back and finally beat Mario 64.
/megaton
August 24th, 2007 at 10:24 am
Well said Jack. Well said.
I too found it very difficult to trust in Nintendo following the N64. Besides some WCW games and QB Club 98 I didn’t really get to many 64 games either. I completely passed on the Cube when it was first released in 2001.
Instead I saved for a PS2 and used my Wal-Mart discount to drop it to $250 (at the time a steal). I then bought Kingdom Hearts, FFX, Ghost Recon among others. But then I also felt my experience with the games starting to fade. I wasn’t having “fun” like I used to.
So I went back to Wal-mart and bought a GC for $99 with a memory card and a free copy of Mario Sunshine. Immediately I started having fun again. I bought Smash Bros. Melee and Mario Kart Double Dash and started to want to play games again.
This was only encouraged by the DS. At first I was skeptical (like many) as to how fun the games would be. I was dead wrong. And it was due to the fun of the DS that I was so excited for the possibility that the Wii brought. I flipped out when I heard the name…but otherwise was fully onboard.
After waiting 17 hours on a cold November day, I was one of the first in the country to get my hands on Wii Sports, and the rest is history. I may not have the time to play all the games I want to these days, but I want the ones I do play, to be enjoyable.
And for that, I’ll stick with Nintendo thanks.
August 24th, 2007 at 10:29 am
Gold star for the art of war reference.
Negative gold star for trading in R.C. Pro Am. I’ll reserve further judgement until I hear you beat Mario 64. Just to be safe, you better get 120 stars.
Very enjoyable read this morning. Thank you.
August 24th, 2007 at 10:52 am
Great read Jack. It’s nice to get some insight into how your perspectives have been formed.
One thing I have noticed. It seems that many people that are totally embracing the Wii and very excited for Nintendo’s future direction skipped out (or invested very little time) in the Gamecube generation. Anyone else notice that?
August 24th, 2007 at 11:07 am
You´ve earned a big *CLAP CLAP CLAP* today my friend
.
After the Gamecube debacle(ohh the droughts), i was set to buy a 360, with all its flashy games, robust online system, and to wait one year for a console i didn´t knew what it would look, made by Nintendo? By that time i gave up all hope on Nintendo, i´m SO happy for waiting until they revealed that shiny white Wiimote, not even in the NES days did i played so much with a console(i´m 29), and that´s because all you´ve explained in your article is right. It took Nintendo 2 generations to realize they needed to evolve, but now i´m glad, Nintendo is the top company once again, and that will result in my most beloved franchises to live a lot more(Nintendo ones).
As always, what an excelent read.
August 24th, 2007 at 11:20 am
A fine post sir. I enjoyed reading it. I give a negative gold star for the Red Sox though….boo Red Sox
August 24th, 2007 at 11:49 am
Jack - An insight into the mind of the fanman, this was an excellent read. I know we have differing opinions here and there, namely around the Metroid series marketing. I will set that aside for now because of the trip down memory lane you toured along with me. Thanks.
(This is now no longer directed at Jack, but more of my own story, though, Jack, feel free to read)
So much of my life has been changed by gaming, the reason I love single player games now is because my two older brothers would play 2-player sports games on the NES…and all that was left for me to play when they were tired of gaming was Metroid or Zelda (in case you were wondering I do feel sorry for them now) But there is more there, the other systems havent done as much for me as Nintendo systems have.
I know it seems tiny now, but the 64 came with 4 controller ports, FOUR! Sure there were adapters for PSX and Sega I believe but the 64’s finest innovation for me was the standard 4-player games. This brought me back into competitive gaming, with Goldeneye and Mariokart. These lead to more intense online games, (namely Starcraft, and Counterstrike) But nonetheless I think that the 64 set the bar, and set it pretty damn high. Besides now I could play games with my older brothers…
Continuing to look at the 64’s days. I see something similar to the Wii yet again. The control stick…This was the first of it’s kind and an entirely new way to control your games. The third leg of the controller which housed the D-pad is very similar to the Wii’s nunchuk attachment. I see the ‘chuk as a plan-B in case the Wii-mote couldnt work as a stand alone control option. Just as the D-pad on the left side of the 64’s controller was a plan-B in case analog sticks didnt work out.
Do not mistake me, I still believe we need the nunchuk. I just think that the games that will make a bigger splash will be Wii-mote only (See; Wii Sports/Play/Fit, Warioware, Zak and Wiki etc.) What the nunchuk will provide is ways to play our old style games with enhanced control (See; RE4, BWii, MP3, TLoZ,…etc) Anyways I kind of lost the point…but I guess only a little, the 64 was more important than you think. Cube…made some new franchises, even though I owned it I see a lot less Nintendo Innovation there.
August 24th, 2007 at 11:51 am
Oh yeah, and the Montreal Canadians rule!
August 24th, 2007 at 12:20 pm
Very well-written and enjoyable column, fanman. I speak for everyone at Infendo when saying how much of an asset you are not only to our site, but to the gaming community at large.
August 24th, 2007 at 1:03 pm
A fine statement indeed, Jack. Unapologetic and sincere, it deserves respect.
On a side note: I’m surprised that neither Jack nor any of the commenters ever purchased a Dreamcast, despite their disappointment with the N64…
August 24th, 2007 at 1:12 pm
Oh but I did, Invis.
Got it a a discount from an old EB Games way back in the day. Split the price with a college friend. Pretty much just played Virtua Tennis and this bootleg CD ROM with every NES game ever created on it. Then that friend sold the Dreamcast on eBay. We don’t speak anymore.
August 24th, 2007 at 1:34 pm
“None of these games were masterpieces…”
Woah. Woah. Woah. You know, Chrono Trigger was in that list. Unless, I’m horribly mistaken, you’re saying that Chrono Trigger is NOT a masterpiece. What the fuck? I’d go so far as to say it’s the single greatest thing mankind has ever done. Seriously.
August 24th, 2007 at 1:39 pm
Juja, allow me to clarify my clunky writing.
The NES games were the ones I was talking about. The SNES ones were supposed to be a second train of thought.
Chrono Trigger is indeed one of the greatest games ever created.
August 24th, 2007 at 1:47 pm
@Invis I have plenty of love for the Dreamcast as well. Mostly actually the 3D Ecco the Dolphin game, and powerstone. Although I have always viewed the DC as the pre-xbox. I will back this up by saying the graphics were amazingly ahead of its time, it had the only online for a console at its time, heck even the controller was huge. But anyone who can show me more insanely difficult Aquatic-Mammal based adventuring is my best friend. So much love, all I wanted to add to Jack was the the 64 was actually a lot more innovative than it was given credit in his article.
August 24th, 2007 at 3:01 pm
i have been there even wiyh the cube era. the gamecube was a brilliant peice of hardware lots of power in a small package.And a few hugew 3rd party titles aside 64 was far better than ps1. go back and look at all the highest rated ps1 and 64 games. youll see that the hype is what drove those feeling of hate for nintendo. what alot of people dont understand is thay were yound and easily tricked into bying into that whole r u red e campaign sony had. just like sega before them the made kids think they were the cool thing and nintendo was for babies. I still see it today a whole generation of now adults still clinging on the being cool, thing instead of having. the cube was a great machine the 3rd parties didnt support it thats it. ps2 had nothing over it except third parties. nintendo was there during the 64 and cube era and so was i.
welcome back
August 24th, 2007 at 4:16 pm
Let me congratulate you first. Its a pleasure to have you at infendo. I enjoy to read your articles, and always find them a good, lenghty piece of literature with great thought and effort putted into it!
Keep up the great job, and here is for having you and your articles many more years at Infendo!
August 24th, 2007 at 6:18 pm
Jack, thank you for that great commentary, it definitely mirrors a lot of my own experiences in gaming. I have owned every Nintendo console (except the poor, awkward, red goggled Virtual Boy) and only strayed last generation when I bought a PS2 upon release (mainly to play PSX games, b/c I never owned one, and to get a DVD player), and then got an XBOX b/c I worked at Blockbuster at the time and was able to get 20% employee discount and a 30 day game pass.
I finally got a cube for Christmas of ‘05 became a Nintendo fan again. The Gamecube was so underrated and I’m still finding great gems of games and generally have a much better experience with them than with any PS2 or XBOX software. The DS really cemented my love for Nintendo however, since it is probably my most played game system since the NES (and probably will surpass even it). The DS fused old school with new school, making games simply fun and intuitive yet have room for complexity and depth as well.
I was right out there in the cold last November too, counting the seconds until the Revolution began. And the Wii truly is a revolution, I cannot think of a more appropriate moniker, as it has brought gaming to the masses and has disrupted the industry like never before. Alas, there are the so called “hard core”, the teen aged to early 20’s males whom were raised not on Atari and NES, but on PSX, PS2, or XBOX, and are confused and bewildered by the change Nintendo is bringing. They cry out in fear and claim Nintendo is destroying their precious concepts of what gaming should be, and will mock and flame anyone who challenges their narrow definition of what a videogame is and should consist of.
I pity those, and yet have hope that they will mature and be awakened by this new golden age of gaming where games are fun again and anyone can play.
August 24th, 2007 at 7:55 pm
Wow…what an article. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it because I can identiy with how you felt about the N64 at the time of it’s presence. I too opted for the Playstaion instead, due to the games costing less and a general interest in other games like Ridge Racer, Crash Bandicoot, and Final Fantsy IIV (but Super Mario 64 rocked my world!).
I pretty much began to lose faith in the Nintendo brand, and became more of a Sony loyalist. In fact, I remember being an EB Games store when it was announced that the Nintendo DS would have two screens. Every sales associate in that store laughed at it and said that the folks at Nintendo have finally lost their minds. I too joined in the conversation and asked “how is that possibly going to succeed over what Sony and microsoft are cooking up?”
Well, I was dead wrong, and I’m a proud DS owner to this. In fact, I just picked up the new DS Lite/Brain Age 2 bundle.
I also own the Wii and I’ve never been disappointed since. Nintendo has proven time and time again that they know what gamers want. And they know what we want because they pay attention to us in the first place. I can’t say the same about Sony on such matters.
August 24th, 2007 at 9:22 pm
you have crafted an incredible piece of videogame journalism…
August 24th, 2007 at 10:50 pm
Great recap on your video game life. I have to say I prefer Nintendo fanboys over PS and X fanboys. Feels like much longer than a year now.
You get a nice stripe on your arm for sticking it out, but you will always be Tingle to me…
August 25th, 2007 at 1:44 am
“I believe it holds the greatest chance of growing this industry in ALL segments for years to come… ”
Except the hardcore section. You know, the one that counts most.
Nintendo abandoned me, I abandoned them for superior systems
August 25th, 2007 at 3:34 am
I support Nintendo because past, present and future I believe it holds the greatest chance of growing this industry in ALL segments.
Yes that’s a good reason, but the mistake in your theory is that Sony was the company that really grew the home console market to what we now call THE industry that surpassed movies (music in a matter of time too).
August 25th, 2007 at 4:41 am
Great read
I shed a tear to think a ninty fanman missed out on the GC era!
What with all the backward compatibility I expect you to make up for lost time!
Might I suggest the first Pikmin if you want something new and refreshing… a brilliant game.
August 25th, 2007 at 1:02 pm
This was a shocking read, you never owned a Gamecube and only a handful of n64 games (and how old you are) but you saw the light and bought into Nintendo’s Wii and it’s ideology.
Well, good for you, I suppose, there’s some great ideas there. I only wish there were more games to back it up. Super Paper Mario still hasn’t been released here, and Metroid’s months away. Thank god I just got the most forward thinking, innovative and staggeringly clever game I’ve played in years a couple days ago (Bioshock).
PS: And while I disagree with you on oh so many points (most of them in fact, eg: In the last 9 months I’d call Nintendo apathetic and arrogant far more than Msoft or Sony) but I know I’m better off talking to a wall…
Paul
August 25th, 2007 at 4:34 pm
“PS: And while I disagree with you on oh so many points (most of them in fact, eg: In the last 9 months I’d call Nintendo apathetic and arrogant far more than Msoft or Sony) but I know I’m better off talking to a wall…”
I love you Paul
August 26th, 2007 at 3:39 pm
Ugh. Of course, someone hàd to mention the latest hype in some sort of attempt to counterweight Nintendo.
Bioshock’s a great game, and deserves the attention (much more so than halo), but what does this game do that is so innovative, I ask you? Psychic powers? Rpg elements? Customisable weapons? The hacking system?
Bioshock’s does a good job at incorporating elements from other genres, yes….but does that make it innovative? I think not.
All said, that was a really good read, Jack. (I have to agree with Jim though.)
>Extinction, I think you’re confusing ‘hardcore’ with ‘mindlessly conservative’ there.