Email: Stop attacking genres

Dear Mr. Malstrom,

Normally I like your site a lot, but lately I have started losing interest in your content. If you were a random forum dweller I would ignore the irritating things you say and latch on to only the information and arguements I find interesting, but as a fan of your blog, it has become just as common lately to find an artcle I love as an article that makes me want to never come back.

My biggest issue is your complete failure to understand the appeal of starfinder Mario, especially Super Mario Galaxy. It is not just the music, nor would it matter if the music was recycled in Galaxy 2. Frankly, I don’t even quite understand what you see in the music of that game, other than a few boss battles. But to completely miss the content of space and playing with gravity is just unacceptable.

Every once in a while I find a game that changes the formula for an existing genre so much, that it doesn’t really qualify as a member of the genre it came from. The game can be fairly bad, but if the genre itself and the content it comes with is good enough then I will love the game. Shadow the Hedgehog took the Sonic fast gameplay, and made it into a 3rd person shooter. The game was bad but the content was decent and the genre it created was one of the best I have ever seen, and the game sold over a million copies. However, the game was attacked by fans and the gaming press for being an inferior game, and the genre died with the game.

I don’t believe ‘genre’ even exists. Back in the Atari and NES days, there was no such thing as ‘genre’ and games were vividly different from one another. ‘Genre’ began to be applied to games beginning in the 16-bit generation such as the ‘fighting game genre’ or ‘RPG game genre’. Sure Nintendo would post ‘Action series!’ or ‘Adventure series!’ on the first NES game boxes, but all the games at the time are very hard to pigeon-hole into a ‘genre’. So today, people just call all these games ‘side scrollers’ or ‘platformers’ which doesn’t work since that includes all of them. It would be like me describing modern gaming as just ‘3d’ or ‘shooting’.

Look at a game like Blaster Master that is about to come to the VC. What is Blaster Master? There is shooting. There is platforming. There is exploring. Some might try to blow this question off as “It’s a Metroidvania game” but that won’t cut it because Blaster Master has two distinctly different type of games running together with it (the side scrolling tank parts and the overhead shooting parts). People just refer to it as ‘Blaster Master’ as it should be.

When Blaster Master came out, no one called the game on progressing any ‘genre’ or anything like that. It was just Blaster Master, plain and simple Blaster Master.

One thing that cannot be denied is that Nintendo has not been making new game worlds since the 16-bit generation after the creation of the Star Fox universe (with a couple of exceptions such as Pikmin). In the old days, Nintendo would come up with a new type of gameplay and then form the game around it. For example,F-Zero and Pilotwings came about due to playing around with Mode 7 type of gameplay.

Twenty years ago, games were new. They were not just new gameplay, they were NEW. There were sequels to best selling games, but Nintendo would be spitting out brand new games from Kid Icarus to Mach Rider to Star Tropics. Some games sold better than others, that is the nature of things.

Nintendo feels that games are purely in the gameplay business. They come up with a new gameplay idea like 3d platforming with spherical gravity and momentum. Instead of creating a new game series with it, they inject this gameplay into a series where it does not belong: with Mario.

By injecting the ‘gravity gameplay’ into Mario, it literally put the Mushroom Kingdom in space which makes no sense whatsoever. The game’s “universe” becomes a joke because it is all being strung apart by the space gameplay mechanic. When Eurogamer reviewed Mario Galaxy, they noticed this as well:

And it’s the right word. Galaxy gives you a universe. Nothing is rationed here – not ideas, not space, not colour. Levels spin off into infinity, whole planets are built just for the sake of one joke or one puzzle. To describe any of them in detail would be to rob you of the hoots of delight and the whimpers of trepidation that will squeeze out of you when you see them for the first time, but the level names tell you all – there’s the dusty and the gusty, the freezeflame and the flipswich. You’ll drip drop to a sling pod, hurry scurry to a sweet sweet, loopdeloop to a deep, dark, melty molten space junk toy time. It’s a whole new language of impossible, unstoppable delights.

In other words, there is no game universe at all in Galaxy. They are just settings wrapped around the gameplay element at the moment. The content is slave to the gameplay instead of the other way around. When the original Super Mario Brothers was made, Miyamoto admitted that he wanted to put water, land, and air levels in. The water levels used the gameplay mechanic that Balloon Fight did. This is the content being in charge of the gameplay instead of the other way around. This is why Mushroom Kingdom is a wondrous universe. Mario 3 and Mario World did the same. Cannons were on the airship because it was an airship. The airship was not put in there because of “cannon gameplay”.

This is why I believe the Core Market for the entire “Game Industry” and on Nintendo’s side is sick. There is a crisis of content, not a crisis of gameplay.

Eurogamer flirts with this problem in this paragraph:

More disappointing is the lack of a strong sense of identity. Many individual levels are dazzling and unforgettable, but overall the game can feel a bit fragmented. The starship in particular doesn’t offer the kind of playground freedom that you want in a Mario hub area – you’re never going to feel like it’s home, the way Mario 64’s castle still does to those of us who are hoping to go there when we die. That slight incoherence is also evident when the balance starts to tip a little too close to adventure game and a little too far from platformer. It just doesn’t feel right to have Mario lighting torches to open locked doors – Link’s agents are surely planning to sue. The extra costumes and cap equivalents also feel a little flimsy in their implementation – no matter how adorable Mario’s fat little bee booty is, these elements just don’t feel well integrated into the main game.

The lack of identity is the lack of content. Or, rather, it is the gameplay being the master of the content instead of the other way around. You can match Tetris to a whole number of different themes. But Tetris without its Russian content just doesn’t ‘feel’ like Tetris.

In the old days, content was king. A customer would see a game with an airplane on the cover and go, “Oh boy! An airplane!” Logically, they expect to fly around in an airplane. The “gameplay” really didn’t matter so long as it was simple and addictive. After all, Space Invaders isn’t any different than your average carnival can target game. But in Space Invaders, you get to be a space ship and shoot aliens! THAT was cool!

Games are totally screwed up on their definition of genre. In books, genre is defined to the content of the story, not the writing style of the story. But in games, genre is not defined to the content of the games. You can show me a World War 2 FPS or a World War 2 RTS and if you don’t like World War 2, you aren’t going to care no matter what gameplay is shown.

This is why everyone instinctively refers to any game Mario is in as a “Mario game”. Whether Mario is in a RPG or racing go-karts or jumping on platforms, customers talk like it is the same genre: the genre of the Mushroom Kingdom (or as I prefer: the Alice in Wonderland element).

Why are game genres being defined on gameplay terms rather than content terms? I like space battle games so I will buy games from Star Fox to Master of Orion where there are many customers (females) who won’t bother in the slightest no matter what gameplay it is in.

I think we’re better off removing ‘genre’ from our thoughts entirely. Perhaps then we might see more interesting games instead of games trying to be ‘king of the genre’.

Super Mario Galaxy is one of those types of games. The content, space and gravity, is good. And the genre, in which platforming meets playing with gravity, is a genre I can get no where else, with a game that sold eight million copies. Now I understand that Nintendo may have no buisness making another super mario starfinder this generation of consoles, but being told that Nintendo should stop making games that combine manipulated gravity and platforming, in addition to being told that Super Mario Galaxy’s appeal is its music when that viewpoint conflicts directly with my own experience with the game, makes me lose interest in the writers opinion. It is in essence telling me that one of my favorite and rarest genres of game should stop being made in spite of great sales because the rest of the fan base will not buy it.

I guarantee you that if Mario Galaxy 2 does not have new orchestra music that people are going to go insane. Then, I will shrug and say, “But I thought you guys said the music didn’t matter?” I see good music propping up not-that-incredible games such as Journey to Silius. Music is far more important in games than I think many people realize. Mega Man 2 would not be what it was without its music, neither would Zelda or the Final Fantasy series.

We’re going to find out what the market truly thinks of Galaxy when Galaxy 2 comes out. I expect Galaxy 2 to be disappointing to Nintendo’s expectations. If it underperforms, people are going to ask why Galaxy did so well and the sequel didn’t. I’m trying to provide the answers today of the questions that will be coming out a year from now.

The Legend of Zelda is another genre I wish you would not attack. I agree with you on many counts, but if they took the puzzle solving out of the game then I would not see the appeal. My generation (the one that started with Ocaria of Time) plays Zelda as an exploration based puzzle game which throws lots of cool toys at you to play with. I do not believe my generation sees Zelda as an arcade game; in fact I doubt a game in the original’s style would be considered a true Zelda game by us. That crucible reference of yours would take all the fun ot of the dungeons, making only the overworld half of the game any fun.
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How could you possibly know when no ‘arcade like’ Zeldas have been made? People said the same to me that a new generation has grown up on 3d Mario and there could not be any possibility for 2d Mario to make any return whatsoever. In fact, this is what Sega says to people who demand a more classic orientated type of Sonic.

Also, your generation did not grow up with Lolo. If classic Zelda played anything like modern Zelda does today, everyone would be asking, “Why play this game when Lolo does it so much better?” Lolo sold pretty well back then too. It did have a number of sequels.

The purpose of first party games is to sell the hardware. The best way to sell hardware is to create an entertainment phenomenon where people rush out and get the hardware. Modern Zelda and Mario games do not do this. They have really fallen far from their previous heights.

When looking at Monster Hunter games and why they sell so well in Japan (where Zelda doesn’t), it is easy for me to see just from looking at the videos that Monster Hunter has more in common with what Zelda is than the modern Zelda games do. (I haven’t yet played Monster Hunter.) Monster Hunter appears to have a combination of arcade-like combat and RPG. This is what Zelda used to be. Zelda not only lacks the arcade-like combat, it doesn’t even resemble much of an RPG anymore. Zelda has turned into more of a puzzle-adventure game. Modern Zelda is what Lolo would have evolved into if the series was brought into 3d.

I am not attacking games like Zelda just as I am not attacking Mario. I am just arguing that modern Mario and modern Zelda games are no longer Mario or Zelda games which is why they no longer create any excitement except among those who grew up with them.

I am not saying modern Zelda is bad. I am saying that modern Zelda is not Zelda at all. It’s a completely different type of game.

I can defend you all the way in attacking genres and sequels to games that sold poorly, but being against the production of sequels to games that sold millions because making the sequel in a different genre would get more sales, that annoys me. Yes, the different format would sell better, but there still remains the millions of fans of the other formula that bought millions of copies of the original. You would make the most money by selling to both, rather than picking the more popular one.
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Final Fantasy still sells millions. However, it has been recognized that Final Fantasy is a series in decline. Final Fantasy is nowhere near the entertainment phenomenon it was with Final Fantasy 7 and games around that time.

Even though Final Fantasy still sells millions, it is correct to point out the series is broken.

Mario Kart: Double Dash sold millions. Yet, everyone pointed out that the series was broken. (Which Nintendo took to heart and corrected with Mario Kart: DS which was designed to get the game back to its SNES arcade-like roots.)

So why the problem with saying the same about modern Mario and Zelda? They clearly aren’t the phenomenons they used to be. So I would have to say the game series were both broken.

By the way, the whole thing about Super Mario Galaxy selling pooly in Japan is annoying; it is an irrelivent arguement because the game still sold eight million copies. Maybe Japanese developers want to be popular in their own country and not just abroad, but rather than a failure to penetrate the Japanese market with a japanese product, I see galaxy as eight million consumers that bought the content of space, playing with gravity, and Mario. Touting around the failure of content to appeal to one group of people while ignoring how it appeals to others in unusually high quantity is a disservice to the content you criticise.

Japan is the future of gaming trends. Japan appears to be in a depression with population decline. Other countries aren’t there yet but are on the way.

The mission of Wii is to expand gaming due to core market decline. When Wii came out, the West’s core market wasn’t really in serious decline as Japan’s was. (It is now, however). This is why games that sell in Japan are pretty important.

I know you guys don’t like it when I criticize modern Zelda and modern Mario, but put yourself in my shoes. There has not been any Mario game that you like for over eighteen years. There has been much bitterness built up over that time. You will notice this when you talk to a former gamer from that era of time. They do not hate star-finder Mario for being star-finder Mario. They hate how it has REPLACED the true Mario game series. The increasing amount of bitterness toward Zelda is also based on the realization of how Zelda is driving away people who liked the game series from the beginning.

The question I keep being seen asked to me goes like this: “What about us who like the elements introduced in  modern Mario and modern Zelda?” This is a false question. The question is actually in reverse and should be like this: “Why should Mario and Zelda cater to those who grew up on the N64 and repel those who built the series in the 8-bit and 16-bit series?” When you people ask me why I am hostile to the modern elements of modern Mario and modern Zelda, it is because…

These elements are driving people like me away from gaming and destroying the entertainment phenomenons these titles used to be!

Ahem. Like I said, there has been decades of bitterness built up.

One thing I’d like to point out is that the “Game Industry” does not fear modern Zelda or star-finder Mario. In fact, the “Game Industry” glorifies them. Star-finder Mario is not a threat to the “Game Industry”. They know that only Nintendo fans will buy modern Zelda or star-finder Mario. They will play the hype game with the fans with those titles.

But with games like Super Mario Brothers 5, it is an entirely different story. We’ve seen people do everything they can to Mario 5 to not even talk about it from E3 2009, to intentionally distort that it is a DS port, that it is a “casual game”, that Nintendo made no effort in making it, and on and on. They are even beginning to start with Zelda’s “motion plus” addition in the upcoming Wii version.

Why is there such industry fear? It is because games like Mario 5 will sell to non-gamers and alter the gaming population (and thus the industry). When the original Super Mario Brothers was released, it was attacked on as well. Computer gamers made fun of it. Trip Hawkins, CEO of EA, declared the NES doomed. But the original Super Mario Brothers sold to non-gamers the current “Game Industry” were not interested in serving: children. These non-gamers ended up re-defining gaming so much that history doesn’t include the computer gaming side of that time period anymore!

Mario and Zelda need to sell to non-gamers in order to become entertainment phenomenons again. The way to do this is to look at the series’ roots. If Mario and Zelda fail to do this, all we can do is just sit around and watch these beloved franchises slowly die.