Nintendo's Iwata Skeptical of In-Game Ads, Episodes 152
Next Generation reports that Nintendo President Iwata has expressed skepticism about the benefits of in-game advertising and episodic content. From the article: "He added, 'Asking customers to pay something monthly, or something periodically, we can never expect that kind of revenue to become the significant, main resources for Nintendo.' Despite Nintendo's adherence to disruptive-thinking, the company is clearly wedded to the concept of up-front single payments for product as its main revenue source."
Thank God. (Score:5, Interesting)
In the eyes of Sony, you are addicts willing to pay anything for a console. In the eyes of other console makers/game producers, you are merely sacks of money and they want the moneys from inside you. One year of playing an online game at $12/month comes out to $144. The amount of money they get from advertisers is also very large considering putting it in a game.
I think that today, communications and technology are cheap. I pay for my broadband internet service provider, why do I have to pay again for another service of essentially the same thing? I would prefer paying $400 with no monthly fee for World of Warcraft instead of $40 with a $13 monthly fee. Why? Because in the two and a half years that it has been out, you've accumulated a price of $40 + $13*30 = $420 and we all know it won't end there. Monthly payments are a means to milk your users. I would rather them charge me lots of money and promise the service until the company is bankrupt. I like that Iwata wants to develop that as a successful business model and I hate that everyone is moving the other way.
I also don't care for product placement in my games. We're so concerned about society not viewing games as art when really they should be! They are the next new media to for artists and it's things like capitalising off of the end user and sacrificing content for product placement that really destroy any efforts to make this happen. Let's make a game that evokes emotions and deep responses from the user
This is totally crazy... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:This is totally crazy... (Score:4, Interesting)
Because people are finally waking up to the fact that uberGraphics don't mean everything.
Seems like Microsoft and Sony are fighting to get the top spot for shooting themselves in the foot with high console prices, while letting "has been" Nintendo walk away with the prize if the Wii is a runaway success at a lower price.
Yeah, from what i've seen, they've been making a decent profit on their console (and dominating the handheld market) whilst Sony and Microsoft bleed money and immature game journalists/teenagers whine about how they're too "kiddie".
And now comes the part where they get revenge, if all goes well
The Old Ways Are Now Revolutionary (Score:5, Interesting)
The issue now is that single payments as the only real revenue stream IS dirsuptive thinking. More and more companies are looking at the 'pay now, then keep paying' school of design. This has been going on for quite some time (expansion packs for PC Games), but the addition of hard drives and on-line capabilities to the major console systems has made this a more feasible concept. We saw the first iteration of it with the last generation, but many of the next gen consoles (especially Sony) appear to be designed around 'upgradable content'. What used to be an anathema to console design is rappidly becoming a 'feature'. Add in the recent success of Blizzard, and now everyone is looking for the next big addiction inducing game that they can reap a constant stream of cash from.
I initially was extremely dissapointed by the lack of an HD in the Wii, but now it looks like a major selling point to me. I don't need to worry about patches, or incomplete games with additional "episodes" to complete the product. I'm also not worried about a lack of variety, as it's in Nintendo's best interest to produce a vast array of games to ensure that they keep selling product, and keep making money.
PS2's largest appeal was the library of games available. The console was neither the most powerful, nor necessarily the most affordable, but people wanted to get it because of the vast selection of games they could choose from. Sony appears to have tossed all that out the window by making a console that is (reportedly) significantly more difficult to program for, thus creating a much greater barrier to entry for new titles. Nintendo, on the other hand, appears to be saying "Here is a relatively easy console to develop for with a brand new opportunity for interface, develop what you will". They did something similar with the DS, and look at it's market share in comparison to the PSP.
The thing that has impressed me the most about Nintendo is that they've figured out the "right" changes to make. When they came out with the DS as their next gen gameboy, the vast consensus was WTF? But they still managed to change the way we play handheld games, and the gaming community is better for it. They're doing the exact same thing with the Wii, everyone let out a collective WTF, but it seems like more and more people feel that Nintendo just gets it. Count me in.
Hunta, Interrupted (Score:3, Interesting)
It's like on Jeopardy when the person in 3rd place bets $0 instead of all their money then wins because nobody expected them to do that and it was a question nobody knew. Nintendo basically bet nothing, just updating their system to current tech instead of expensive future tech, and is going to win big time because the other guessed wrong. Even without their new controller they would win this round.
Re:Episodic Content (Score:3, Interesting)
I totally agree with you, If you doing something, do it totally.
1) Advertising in your game? = Make the game free
2) Episodic content? = Do from the start with the same price throughout.
3) Pay up front? = You get the whole game.
Do anything of these, and if your game looks good, I'm on board. But MIX any of the above together and you lose me and my money.
I'm not spending £50 on a game full stop. And then if you expect me to drop another couple of quid to get horse armour then you are sadly mistaken. I know people will say "But you don't have to buy it if you don't want to." And they are right, but I do want it, but I don't want them drip feeding my wallet. as I play the game I will wonder about the parts I'm missing, whether it's unbalancing my game or spoiling it. And that puts me off buying the game in the first place.
I want to come home after a day at work and now I have the full game sitting on my shelf for whenever I want to play it.
So far it seems nintendo are sticking with 3) and 3) alone - and as long as they do - I will stick with them.
advertising (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Nintendo? You? Really? (Score:5, Interesting)
First off, I think you're trying to be comprehensive here, but you forgot more than a few titles. Hey You Pikachu, Puzzle League and its GBC equivalent, Puzzle Challenge, and the trading card game spring to mind. If we're not counting those, that's fine, but then the pinball games, Snap, Dash, and (if I'm not mistaken) Ranger and Troizei shouldn't be on the list either. You can't seem to make up your mind what counts for the list, apparently.
The bigger issue, though, is whether or not the game is "episodic." By all definitions of the term I've seen...no, it's not. The games are self-contained, and you don't need to keep paying to advance the plot. You may not be able to catch all of the Pokémon, maybe, but that's not "episodic content."
Also, the games have a hell of a lot more content than you'd get in an episode. Each grouping of RPGs (think Red/Blue/Yellow) has its own plot and brings new mechanics into the mix. They are full-fledged games.
True, the games might have been popular for the Pokémon characters, but there was always, ALWAYS more to them than that. Even in the games where the characters were just used to sell the title, improvements were made. Pokémon Puzzle League, for instance, was a very nice update of Tetris Attack and added modes that the SNES version didn't have.
I'd also argue the in-game advertising. The games never, ever blatantly tell the player "Go buy a stuffed Pikachu!" or advertise any of the other spinoff products, whereas in-game ads are typically for real products that don't fit into the world. Have you seen ads for Serta matresses or Mountain Dew in the game's gyms? Didn't think so. The game spawned the merchandising, and that's entirely different...especially since the game came first.
Really, I don't see how you COULD call Pokémon episodic or accuse it of having in-game advertising. By every discussion and definition of the terms I've seen...it just doesn't, plain and simple.