Let me begin by saying this. I agree with you with the fact that the NES and Wii Revolution are the best things to happen to gaming. In fact, when I got my Wii, I had to two games, Wii Sports and Twilight Princess. Take a guess which one I made sure to play for first for hours and days on end first, Wii sports naturally. However I still liked Twilight Princess. But take the analogy of women for a second. You have two women, one is Twilight Princess and the other is classic Zelda (and I mean YOUR definition of classic zelda.) Twilight Princess is that fair weather friend while classic zelda is marriage material. Naturally one would prefer marriage material.
I will also agree with you that the Gamecube direction of Nintendo is bad for Nintendo and that the 3DS direction is extremely gamecube-esque. However, while this is bad for you, it isn’t bad news for me. I may not love my Gamecube, I still had some fun with it. For a few reasons.
1) Strengthen my purchasing power- My greatest purchasing power in video games was under the gamecube direction. I remember early on with the Wii, I had been wondering, “What the hell happened to the player’s choice selection?” The fact of the matter was, Nintendo had been releasing games which they could be strong price makers and people would take it. Notice at the end of the Wii’s lifecycle, we are getting that back. Instead now we have “Nintendo Selects” which is basically the same. Now we are seeing more power to price takers (because of a shift in demand). Even if that doesn’t happen, used games start to flood the market, making it easy to pick what I want.
2) Revival in old games- You stated by your logic business needs to sell to their customers. However, in Nintendo’s case, they are making games they want to develop, not what consumers want to buy. So what do customers want? Arcade games. But Nintendo refuses to make them. So there is only one way they can make a profit. Resell and provide arcade games. But consumers already bought them. So the next thing would be to provide them at a discounted price. In addition, provide gifts for people to give incentives to repurchase these old games. Keep in mind, these design issues aren’t unique to Nintendo either.
Take a look at some of these games that were released on the Gamecube era.
-The Legend of Zelda: Collector’s Edition
-Megaman Anniversary Collection
-Megaman X Collection
-Midway Arcade Treasures 1,2,3
-Sonic Gems Collection
-Sonic Mega Collection
-Activision Anthology
-Capcom Classics Collection 1 and 2
-Namco Museum
-Sega Classics Collection
-Sega Genesis Collection
-SNK Arcade Classics
-Street Fighter Anniversary Collection
-Street Fighter Alpha Anthology
-Final Fantasy Anthology
-Final Fantasy Chronicles
Keep in mind this is a small list of those games. As it stands, Nintendo is already giving away free games for those who already purchased a 3DS.
Here’s an idea I’ve been giving heavy thought. There is a correlation between entertainment quality and economic conditions.
In the United States, economic conditions were on fire in the 80s. We saw the rise of the personal computer and its games as well as the rise of handheld and home console gaming (the Atari crash was an aberration). But other entertainment was very strong. We had fantastic movies (Aliens, Terminator, Back to the Future). Pop culture exploded (e.g. Michael Jackson phenomenon). It wasn’t just good games. There was a ton of good movies and good music. Even the toys were interesting (kids of the 80s will remember the Micro Machines).
The 90s, also economically strong but not quite as fire, as a slow decline but the quality was there across all entertainment. Solid singers from the 90s, solid movies, you get the picture.
Japan economically exploded in the 80s, and the West was invaded by Japanese cars, Japanese electronics (Sony’s Walkman), Japanese video games (Nintendo, Sega), and Japanese anime (Macross, Akira, etc.). But ever since Japan’s economic conditions worsened in the latter 90s, their entertainment output has declined as well.
We like to think entertainment is in a world unto itself but perhaps it isn’t. Perhaps entertainment quality is tied to economic conditions. What you notice was a higher entertainment trend in the Gamecube Era is consistent with this view. If I’m correct in this, entertainment quality will sharply rise when economic conditions improve. Some of the great artists seemed to be around during economic fortunate times. Biographers imply these artists were ‘so smart’, they sought these ‘centers of trade’. Perhaps that is backwards. Perhaps these people grew precisely because of the ‘centers of trade’. Is it a coincidence that Shakespeare and that period of great English poets appeared right at the cusp of England’s economic eruption which allowed the nation to spread across the world?
What would economic conditions have to do with art aside from funding?Well, I’ve been in dying areas as well as growing areas. There is a type of mojo in the air that is absorbed by everyone. For example, during the golden period of New York City, every artist wanted to be in New York. There was something about the town, some sort of energy, that permeated throughout people. Of course, New York is not that way today.
This idea I have not considered much about. But there is a clear correlation. And it does explain why it feels entertainment’s quality has been in steep decline since the economic decline.
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