Nintendo's Year: Editorial
Well, Nintendo has probably had their toughest year ever in quite a few decades. With regards to the mighty powerhouse of the GameCube, it could be argued that nothing has gone right for them, as well as several factors that have been encountered:
- Complete game drought for the first 6 months of the year, with only Capcom’s Resident Evil remake to keep GC alive.
- Eternal Darkness, although very much anticipated throughout the years 2000, 2001, and 2002, is not selling as much as expected.
- Super Mario Sunshine greeted with a disappointing mood and sales in the United States (for a Mario game).
- RareWare leaves Nintendo for Microsoft; huge decline in sales for Nintendo and also a disappointing future.
- Microsoft XBox frequently outsellsthe GameCube in the West (and destroying it's sales in Europe and Australia).
- Bug ridden Metroid Prime released (hopefully for just the first shipment, but this is extra bad news as these were bought by avid N fans who lambasted the game across the net for having crashes).
- Nothing able to sell systems in the amount Nintendo, and fans, hoped.
- Starfox Adventures: Dinosaur Planet was (in many people's eyes) an average RareWare game, that was left to fend off the onslaught from XBox’s Splinter Cell and PlayStation 2’s Grand Theft Auto: Vice City in Europe and Australia.
- Zelda sales slowing down after initial burst, and being out sold by Pokemon and Mario Party 4, with analysts already saying it’s another franchise disappointment for Nintendo.
- NOTHING came of the infamous MEGATON rumour (announcement) that flooded the internet for several weeks.
Overall a pretty unsuccessful time was enocunetretd, and on a personal note I have never been more disappointed with Nintendo. I will get to this in a moment, but let's reflect the great things that have truly stood outshone Nintendo's competitors.
- Square returns with new, and old, popular franchise games for GameCube and GameBoy Advance.
- European launch resulted in a great success with 1 million units sold in under 3 months, combined with a great European launch line up of games.
- Resident Evil remake sells over 1.1 million copies around the world, surpassing Capcom’s expectations and helps create a new audience for Nintendo.
- Animal Crossing released to solidsales, and offers a great and unique "Nintendo" style of gameplay, and is loved by many worldwide.
- Capcom announce 5 exclusive Gamecube games, all with promise and great sales.
- Gameboy Advance goes from strength to strength, bringing the total installed base to approximately 30 million.
- Metroid Prime is released to incredible reviews and sells 500,000 copies in a few weeks. Finally GameCube has its unique killer app.
- Pokemon defies analysts and critics and becomes Japan’s biggest selling game of the year, and will probably sell 4 million units by the years end (Ruby & Sapphire versions combined).
- Nintendo, once again, become Japan’s number 1 games publisher with over 8 million titles sold in 2002.
So, some good and bad, as is to be expected. For me the big disappointments have been Super Mario Sunshine and Zelda; two games that have not met gamer's high expectations, because Nintendo set the bar so unbelievably high with Mario 64 and Zelda: Ocarina of Time that anything less than the pinnacle of gaming would have be underrated.
I think I’m also saddened because I know Nintendo is able to remain successful, but they haven’t with these two games. They feel rushed and unfinished, as if they needed another year of refinement to bring them up to scratch. Don’t get me wrong, Mario Sunshine and Zelda: TWW aren’t bad games, just incredibly disappointing ones. They are not as good as their predecessors, and therefore certainly haven’t bettered them, which they should have! In honesty they are both pointless sequels in my opinion, and go against all that Hiroshi Yamauchi fought so hard to keep Nintendo from doing. On countless occasions he would state how sequels should be done ONLY if they were worth doing, and something new and revolutionary could be brought to them, i.e. they shouldn’t be practically the same games with different graphics, which is exactly what Mario Sunshine and Zelda: TWW are (in fact they’re worse than their predecessors!).
This year would’ve been a total disaster, if it wasn’t for one game, that single handedly restored my faith in the Gaming Genius that is Shigeru Miyamoto, Nintendo, and games in general, Metroid Prime. This is one of THE greatest games EVER!!!! Just about every decent gaming journalist has raved about this game, and yet it’s still under hyped! In short, it’s another monumental achievement in videogames that only Nintendo could’ve done. When I finished this game I remembered why I loved gaming, and why Nintendo were a games developer like no other. It doesn’t matter who’s on the credits, or where Miyamoto’s name is listed, because Metroid Prime is ALL Miyamoto! It oozes a brilliance and charm that ONLY he can create, confirming it has been his hand guiding the game to level of brilliance it has achieved. You become Samus Aran! You feel what she feels, you totally EXPERINCE her life. Not wanting to give anything away, but seeing the expression on Samus’s face having played through the entire game (as her) is as dramatic and emotional as watching Zelda and Link part at the end of Ocarina of Time. Metroid Prime is a PROPER game! In fact videogame history goes 1998 Ocarina of Time, 2002 Metroid Prime, with nothing in particular, on any system, in between!
The GameBoy Advance has many great games, the best being Advance Wars. This game is nothing short of stunning! Metroid Fusion is also a great game and replaying Yoshi’s Island brought back many fun memories.
As for 2003, well, at the moment it seems like another year of sequels for Nintendo, which is all well and good, and sure to sell a certain amount of GCs, but it isn’t what I want to play, unless they take the games in a new, improved direction. I’m hoping we get some new franchises, and more importantly Miyamoto takes more control of projects. I think he’s been spread a little too thin, or been under way too much pressure to get Mario Sunshine and The Legend of Zelda:The Wind Waker out to try and fight off some of the competition. The problem is that doesn’t work for Nintendo games. They need to have the required time, effort and talent spent on them otherwise you can really tell. Sure all other companies can getting away with releasing sub standard stuff, in fact if any other company released games as good as SMS and TWW we’d be raving about them.
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The Big Nerd: The Supreme Grammar Nazi
bryan49449: ... And the only reason that you can still post is because you put the file back that you HACKED out on the old boards!
bryan49449: I guess you got BORED WITH THE TEMP'S EH?!
GMan5589: . . .
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Bryan's Words of Wisdom:
Big N: Teach me your ways of getting things in order, Bryan.
Bryan: Ok, this is what I would have done...
Bryan: YOU STUPID MOTHERFUCKER! YOU BEST GIVE ME YOUR GODDAMN GOOP OR I'LL SHOVE A FUCKING BUTCHER KNIFE UP YOUR FREQUENTLY PENETRATED ANUS!!!11
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