Nintendo, has it changed? Don't miss this once-in-a-decade opportunity!
2024-07-21
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After Nintendo suddenly launched a mysterious "smiley man" video last week, it was finally officially announced this week. This kind of promotional method of not saying anything at the beginning and only releasing an unclear video is often a trick that small and medium-sized manufacturers like to play. I didn't expect Nintendo to start playing mysterious.As many players guessed, this is a completely new work in the "Famicom Detective Club" series after 35 years.Although many players expressed their expectations, especially those who had experienced the FC era, many players were disappointed.On the one hand, this disappointment is due to the fact that the real-life style of the previous "Smiley Man" video is very different from the cartoon style of the actual game, and it is more of a suspense puzzle game rather than a horror game, which disappointed the players who originally expected it to be a real-life horror game.On the other hand, many players are fed up with Nintendo's "poor" game lineup in the past two years. Of course, the so-called "poor" is in quotation marks and relative. In fact, Nintendo's "niche games" are increasing, and the overall quality of first-party games has been declining every year. Does Nintendo seem to have changed?That’s right. In the past year or so, many of the first-party games released by Nintendo have been quite niche and have not been highly regarded among the general public, giving people a feeling that “the overall level has clearly declined.”Especially after experiencing a wave of blockbuster titles in the early days of NS, this trend of overall quality decline has become more obvious. I believe even new players can feel it. The most intuitive thing is that the spending on NS has decreased.Not to mention the distant past, right now there is the newly released "Nintendo World Championship Famicom World Congress". Although the FC games used as competition items are all classics that have gone down in history, this is obviously a niche game, clearly aimed at old players and players who like to collect.In the past year, there were also works such as "Memories of an Alien Code" and "Eternal Blue Stream", which were also niche-oriented and their overall evaluations were not high.In fact, "Pikmin 4", or the "Pikmin" series, was originally a core and niche game. Thanks to the foundation laid by "Pikmin 3 Deluxe" and the likable image of Pikmin, this work has achieved good results.If we look back at Nintendo's first-party games in 2023, I'm afraid many players can only think of "Kingdom of Tears" and "Mario Marvel", plus "Pikmin 4".Other titles either sold poorly or were controversial or received negative reviews. For example, Fire Emblem Engage, which had controversial character design, Everybody 1-2-Switch!, which most players could not enjoy, and Detective Pikachu Returns, which had a bad reputation and a collapse in price...However, works such as "Kirby Wii Deluxe" and "Bayonetta Origins" are just so-so, with relatively mediocre sales and quality.Such a lineup has also caused many players' NS to be left gathering dust or even become a small yellow croaker.So back to the original question, the decline in the overall quality and reputation of Nintendo's first-party products in the past one or two years, is it really because Nintendo has run out of ideas? Has Nintendo really changed?One of the reasons is that the core team has already moved to develop Switch 2 games. But this is only part of the reason. The more important reason is that the sales volume of NS has reached a high level, giving Nintendo the opportunity to test the waters and make new breakthroughs.Everyone knows thatZelda》"Mario" and "Animal Crossing" can be big sellers, but being big sellers doesn't mean all players will like them.Now that NS has a large enough sales volume, as the saying goes, "those who should buy it have already bought it." If you are interested in Zelda and Mario, you have already bought NS. So if Nintendo still wants to continue selling NS, who should it sell it to? Of course, those players who are interested in other types and styles of games.In order to attract these niche players, Nintendo naturally has to come up with corresponding works. This is why Nintendo dug out niche antiques such as "Eternal Blue" and even launched adult horror games such as "Smiley Man".In addition, the current stage of NS is also the best time for Nintendo to try new genres and new IPs. Anyway, NS has reached an unprecedented height, and Nintendo can freely dabble in new genres and try new IPs.If the game can get a good response, that would be great, and both Nintendo and the players would be happy; but even if the response is mediocre or even a failure, it will have little impact on the success of NS. It can even achieve very good sales with such a high installation volume, and the negative impact of the failure will soon be covered up by Switch 2 and new games.These niche works, trial works, and transitional works may not satisfy most players, but they are definitely very rare.As mentioned above, thanks to the current sales of NS, Nintendo can launch these works without burden. If the installed base is insufficient, like the N64, NGC, and WiiU eras, sales are mediocre or even dead, and Nintendo itself is at a critical juncture, there will definitely not be such a flourishing scene.In other words, the more Nintendo releases weird games like it does today, the more it demonstrates its current success and confidence in the future.As a self-media company, we rely on traffic to make a living. The number of readers of each article directly determines our income. From this perspective, we would certainly like to have hot topics every day, and it would be best if there were games like "Animal Crossing" and "Zelda" that attracted a lot of attention every year.But if we put aside the issue of survival, I selfishly hope that Nintendo can launch more such niche games. Many times, it is these niche games or new games that can bring unexpected innovation and fun.In addition to testing the waters, now is also a good opportunity for Nintendo to revive old IPs. Even a 35-year-old series like "Famicom Detective Club" can be revived and released as a new game, so "Color Code" and "Eternal Blue" are even more unsurprising. There are many other series that have been shelved, and the most popular one is undoubtedly "Golden Sun".If it has enough strength and luck, and can be revived like "Pikmin" today, the future will naturally be bright, with sequels and peripherals all planned."The Legend of Zelda" and "Mario" at the end of this year may be Nintendo's last effort on NS. Soon we will be able to see new popular blockbusters on Switch2.But while pursuing these popular new works, we also hope that Nintendo can continue to leverage the final value of NS, launch more niche and trial works, and bring more fun that is different from traditional ones.
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