Gamecube's Success
The latest entries into the next generation race (Xbox and Gamecube) are hitting their stride this summer. This summer is going to be a decisive factor in Nintendo’s success, as a couple of major franchise hits are waiting in the wings for the Gamecube and the Gameboy Advance. We’re not talking about some churned over PS2 port or some Dreamcast screw up (Crazy Taxi for Gamecube anyone?), but rather the names that define gaming itself…or more specifically Mario Sunshine and the tentatively titled “Zelda” for Gamecube. Another important upcoming event for Nintendo, which could potentially be more important than summer 2002, will be E3 2002, the Los Angeles based exposition that showcases the hottest games and peripherals for the year and beyond. It’s also a place where important announcements are made and many questions are answered by companies. It’s also a place where Nintendo has been respected through the years as THE place for the public to see Nintendo explode with all new games, and deliver the goods to the public.
Let’s back up the scooter a bit to a long time video game giant (and once housing a franchise as big as Mario himself) Sega, and the days when the Dreamcast wasn’t associated with a gravestone. The system had many killer hits such as Soul Calibur and Crazy Taxi, but the system just didn’t sell [in countries such as Japan], which ultimately led to the system’s demise and Sega being a third party developer. The silver lining however, was Sega delivering the impossible and planting Sonic to bloom on competing systems.
This may be stretching it a bit, but I believe that Nintendo finds their Gamecube system in that very same position. PlayStation 2 is still in the lead and is unmatchable in terms of installed users, and Nintendo and Microsoft are battling it out for system supremacy and second place. Nintendo, however, can still correct the situation and pull ahead of Xbox providing that their mega franchises are top notch, well accepted by us video gamers, and sell in big numbers.
Just how important are these franchises for Nintendo’s success? Well, consider the famed videogame developer that makes Nintendo well, Nintendo…Shigeru Miyamotyo. It is vital to Nintendo’s success that Miyamotyo-san is kept happy at Nintendo, and that his products sell. And like it or not, E3 is the big test to see whether his creations can live up to the high expectations set by the entire industry. At E3, Mario and Zelda will be fully unveiled as playable games to the public, as well as many other games from Nintendo’s second-tier development houses (hopefully Metriod Prime being one of them).
If you’re reading this, then you’re probably wondering about the point of this article. Well, Mario Sunshine and Zelda have been generally receiving bad vibes by Nintendo fans and the media in general, which is mostly attributed to Zelda’s new cell shaded exterior and the “different” gameplay that Mario has taken. If the general public plays these games and quite frankly doesn’t like them, then this could spell disaster for Nintendo and people such as me who purchased the system for these games and not shabby ports of PS2 and Dreamcast games.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that Mario and Zelda will be bad games; they just won’t live up to people’s set expectations of the games. And make no doubt about it; the games will sell just because of the names of the titles, but probably not in quantities that Nintendo would have hoped for. I’m no Nintendo marketing executive, but I’m betting much of Nintendo’s strategy centers around the success of these titles, and other titles (such as Metriod Prime) for the future. After all, games are what sell a system.
Nintendo refuses to be judged on the mere look of the game; they’re convinced that if the gameplay can excel, then the graphics can be dealt with. I generally like to think along those same lines, but since our society has become more image-orientated, video games are curving towards that mentality; it is often impossible to play a game with incredible graphics and fantastic gameplay. If the game features fantastic gameplay (which I’m betting it does), then everyone can get used to the graphics eventually. If the game doesn’t play well, then Nintendo will definitely have to rethink the game before dumping it onto the market. They won’t let the public judge the game based on their looks until people have played it.
In conclusion, we don’t really know what is floating around in Miyamotyo’s artistic mind…he is a highly respected as a videogame developer and as an artist, and is noted for delivering the goods for Nintendo when they mattered the most (the N64’s success was based around The Legend of Zelda 64). If he feels that this is the turning point in the Zelda and Mario series, then he can make it to his vision…but his visions of the game might not match the visions that we had hoped for as a game community (a more mature game, for example). Whatever happens in the next 6 months could swerve Nintendo from a chance at industry dominance to a company playing catch-up to the Xbox. Whether Mario and Zelda are what we expected or not, you can bet that Nintendo will make these games something to remember.