Nintendo's Simpler Game stratagy (1 Viewer)

[Derrik Draven]

You guys should give Steel Battalion (Xbox) a try, if you like a challenge. LOVE that game. I was taunted to be it, eh Romier? And, *patting my back*, I did.

A "simple" game doesn't bother me or worry me. "Simple" doesn't necessarily mean easy.

Case in point, Tetris. Is there really anything more simple than that? Okay, maybe Pong but my point being that in Tetris you just flip shapes around to make them fit better.

...and it gets damn hard as they "simply" speed up the fall rate.

But, an easy game? One that the average gamer can blow through without any challenge....well, I honestly can't see a damn thing entertaining about that. Seems like a bore, to me.

I truly can't recall any mass petition of modern gamers complaining that games have become too hard or complicated. That makes Nintendo's "strategy" more strange to me. Perhaps they're just trying to make their games more accessible for their core audience; really young gamers?

 

[DonRoeber]

Or maybe Nintendo is trying to please the a very wide audience of gamers, including entire families, instead of concentrating on the small but vocal group of hard core gamers, who have different expectations out of their video games. As someone who enjoys gaming, but isn't a hard core gamer, I play my GameCube a WHOLE lot more than my PS2. And I haven't bought an X-Box yet. My PS2 is only really used for Final Fantasy games, and although I'd like to get around to playing Halo and KOTR, I haven't felt the need to pick up an X-Box yet. My GameCube is played almost every day because of Animal Crossing, and I've spent a lot of time playing the Resident Evil games, Zelda, Mario, Metroid, Pikmin and Eternal Darkness on the GameCube as well. I'll be picking up Soul Calibur II, Mario Kart and Pikmin 2 later this year.

 

[Morgan Jolley]

I think that Nintendo should instead just include difficulty settings in their games. This solves the problem from the get-go.

Also, I enjoy a challenging game, but I think that what they should also do is provide and incentives system, much like PDO has. You play through, do really good, and you get something that is actually worth getting. This way, the main game is easy, but the extra stuff is harder.

Overall, they should just try to make the games fun. Hard, easy, whatever, so long as they're fun.

And Romier, not to be rude, but if you're going to copyright the phrase, then it should be "rhythm."

Square taking such a left field approach to this franchise worries me. Sure FF8 was a lame to say the least, but 9 and 10 made up for it tenfold. I have read info on FF12 that is trickling out, and it is said Square is planning to make a "drastic" change in the FF license

But they've already done the other stuff. You've got those things to have and love right now. Why not play around a little and see if they do something good? FFX was very different from the others in MANY ways and it came out great. Give them a chance. If they F their games up, we'll know and they'll pay.

 

[Romier S]

And Romier, not to be rude, but if you're going to copyright the phrase, then it should be "rhythm."

Also not to be rude, but I said trademark not copyright. I also hope you didn't actually take that as being serious since I was making every effort in my writing to be as facetious as possible.

Thank you nonetheless for your dilligence in becoming a human spellchecker Morgan. I don't know what I would I would do without you.

 

[Morgan Jolley]

It's a nagging habit of my own. I honestly have a peeve for bad spelling. It makes me go crazy on message boards outside of HTF.

And you're right, you said trademark, my apologies.

 

[Jay Mitchosky]

[Brutal spelling] makes me go crazy on message boards outside of HTF.

You and me both, Brother.

This is a really wild discussion. For my part I like challenging but not impossible to the point of frustration. It's other faults aside Quantum Redshift for the Xbox drove me insane as I could never finish first as the levels progressed. Over and over and over again gets old very quick. I would have to include games like Enclave as well where checkpoints or mid-level saves are not included. At the time of its release Romier made an excellent point that the lack of checkpoints really elevates the tension level. No argument there. I recall literally taking a deep breath after holding it for an extended period when those magic words came on screen in Halo (remember The Flood, anyone?). But the flipside is that it is suicide-inducing to invest a pile of time in a level only to come crashing down at the very end and start over. Think of the number of potential buyers who were turned off of Enclave - never even gave it a shot - because every review and comment on the net made mention of the extreme level of difficulty due in large part to lack of save points. There has to be a happy medium - sufficient difficulty to maintain tension and challenge while offering at least a glimmer of hope to the more casual gamer.