Are you telling me the game company, called Nintendo, who refused to make a home console 2d Mario for 16 years, despises classic Zelda (Aonuma has said this), really, really, really hates Metroid, and keep telling us that any love of old games is ‘nostalgia’ that we should ‘put aside to play modern 3d incarnations of the same franchise’ is suddenly going on a NES love-fest?
No.
Nintendo has altered its strategy. Nintendo sees itself as a maker and maintainer of intellectual properties.
Nintendo will no longer just make video games. Instead, it will make software-that-reinforces-the-market-appeal-of-the-intellectual-properties. “What you say!” the reader demands raising fists. Look at the smartphone games. What is the purpose of the Nintendo smartphone games? It is to strengthen and advertise the IP and do so profitably.
Nintendo didn’t make much money off of Pokemon Go. But Nintendo’s Pokemon IP received a HUGE BOOST.
The Universal Rides for Nintendo revolves around Nintendo intellectual properties. The purpose of the ride is to strengthen the IP awareness.
The Amiibos revolve around the IPs and strengthening them.
There is no debate over what is said above. So why not take the next step and apply this thinking to the NES Mini?
The NES Mini’s mission may not be to ‘sell a ton of units’. After all, Nintendo is unlikely making much of a profit from the NES Mini. But what Nintendo is doing is strengthening the IPs of its games and of its most iconic console.
If NES Mini is needed to strengthen the IP stable, it shows just how terrible modern Mario and Zelda are (we already know modern Metroid is terrible. Thanks Sakamoto!).
I think the NES Mini should be seen more as an IP boosting device. The NES Era is Nintendo’s Golden Age (I guess SNES is Silver Age, N64 is Bronze Age). You could rename it as ‘Nintendo Golden Era Re-Released’ instead of NES Mini. The name makes more sense in terms of its mission.
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