Working Title 09.23.11: Working Rant -- Another 3DS Rant (Part 2)

Posted by Jordan Williams on 09.23.2011

Nintendo has been doing several things wrong with the Nintendo 3DS, but how could they fix it? 411's Jordan Williams takes an in-depth look and gives his thoughts in this week's Working Title!

You're lucky I didn't put the video at the bottom on autoplay.

Welcome to the #1 Column to use it's opening line not to talk about video games but yell FUCK YEAH MARK HENRY IS WORLD CHAMPION!.

Usually I don't like to mix my wrasslin' talk with my video game talk but such a momentous occasion has to be recognized by the WORLD. Speaking of things that are being recognized by the WORLD it seems like since my last column the 3DS had it's show at TGS which showed the world that it just might not be dead yet. Which sort of blew my other column idea of what they need to do to save the handheld out of the water.

…Or did it?

Last time I mainly just complained and bitched about what the 3DS was doing wrong and how Nintendo were really mucking this whole thing up and this week I am going to give some ideas on how to fix this current downtrend and that's even after the stuff they announced at Tokyo Game Show. So since I haven't been playing much (trying to cleanse my pallet for the Fall season) let's just go ahead and hop right into it.


Working Rant – GET IT TOGETHER NINTENDO…AND HERE'S SOME SUGGESTIONS!

So last time on Working Title I lovingly lamented at how Nintendo is completely fouling up the run of the 3DS and that they really have no one else to blame but themselves. The fans are here, the fans stuck with you even through the worst times of the Wii and the dead times of the DS. But Nintendo got greedy and more importantly VERY cocky and ended up thinking that the same tried and try system of working Nintendo Magic on the masses would fly in the age of the iPhone.

Suffice to say they were dead fucking wrong. Now although the 3DS is selling it's nowhere near as strong as Nintendo would've hoped it to be and worse yet they are scrambling to try to do ANYTHING to capture the Nintendo fan base which is quickly turning to alternatives like the iPhone or god forbid they are waiting for the Vita. Worse STILL is that Nintendo has now conditioned it's fan base to expect a hardware revision so bad that they are flat out refusing to buy the 3DS because they don't want to be hurt like they were with the DS and the GBA.

The one way Nintendo could fix that is to release worthwhile games that would just force consumers to pick up the 3DS despite the fears but they haven't even been able to do that. To say the DS launch line up or even the first year was a blockbuster year is just a flat out lie. But in the same time period you at least saw games that gave you hope, gave you a proof of concept about how the touch screen would actually change the way you play games. So far on the 3DS the best games are just ports of games that have been out for 5 (or is some cases, 15) years already…just in fully optional 3D. Now that would've normally been enough to satiate the Nintendo hopeful…five years ago.

But what Nintendo needs to do to salvage the 3DS run is either one of two things. They either need to get out those types of games that really showcase the 3DS and WHY the 3DS exists and WHY we would want to buy it.
And to give them a little bit of credit with the TGS show they actually tried, they honestly tried to show us stuff that was actually interesting and playable on the 3DS and NEW. …But they still need MORE.

We need games!

Just to put it bluntly, Nintendo needs games. Usually Nintendo is the last company I would say that about because out of the Big Three they still are king when it comes to the first party stuff…but the first party stuff has officially hit the point where it no longer cuts it. How many variations of Mario have we had? How about Zelda?

We all know that we come back to Nintendo time and time again for these games because these are what Nintendo does best…but with every console or handheld what Nintendo did best was show us something new. When Mario showed up on the SNES we had 75 levels of craziness and new gameplay mechanics that were previous impossible on the NES. When Mario showed up on the N64 we had our first full 3D world to roam around in. Even New Super Mario Brothers gave us SOME improvements over the last.

But when you look at the 3DS do you really see anything new there besides the fact that it's in 3D? Optional 3D at that? While some of the puzzles and levels will surely benefit from the 3D the game doesn't hinge on its success…you can play the entire game without the 3D and it would be fine.

This is where Nintendo needs to use that one word that they HATE to use.

New I.P

When is the last time Nintendo had a legit new I.P? Rehash, Remake, Re-Release is Nintendo's bread and butter and it's just not going to work. Especially with the 3DS and ESPECIALLY with the Wii U Nintendo NEEDS some fresh blood. They NEED something that will catch the eye. I am not saying Nintendo needs to abandon the first party support because that is just fuckin' dumb. But the age of Nintendo Magic has died and they need to find something new to get people talking. They need that ONE game, hell, even those TWO games that show you the 3DS (and possibly the Wii U) are viable and it's something you have to have.

The sad thing is, the more I think about and how Nintendo usually handles situations like this…it seems all the more likely that they won't capitalize on this opportunity. Instead of putting the effort in to craft a new franchise that can stand up alongside Mario they will probably make another sequel or bring back a franchise from the de—

…Yeah, they will do that. I am not saying that Kid Icarus is going to be bad; in fact I think the exact opposite. Depending on how well it's received Kid Icarus might be the savior of the 3DS in the long run. But I just feel that the opportunity would've been so much better used on a new IP that gave it a fresh feel instead of falling back to the Nintendo Magic way of doing things. Of course this generation (hell, even the last generation) of gamers probably had never heard of Kid Icarus or the Pit character until Super Smash Brothers Brawl came out so in a way it IS a new IP…but in the eyes of the people who they keep asking (and are now just flat out BEGGING) to give Nintendo another shot it's the same old thing. And that's only ONE game. While Kid Icarus might be to the 3DS what Kirby's Canvas Curse was for the DS, it's still only one game in the foreseeable future that looks like it takes advantage of everything the 3DS can do. When Canvas Curse came out for the DS it opened the floodgates for new ideas and new games. Kid Icarus seems more like a case of "too little, too late" and that's a HORRIBLE thing to say for a handheld that hasn't even been out for a year.

And the TGS games? There's no guarantee that ANY of those games are actually going to make it to the West, especially if you take Nintendo's recent localization practices into account. And out of that bunch the only one that has the name power and the fan base to stave off extinction for the 3DS is Monster Hunter 4 which is still a ways away. Fire Emblem is notorious for not doing well here when it IS released and Dynasty Warriors might be cool but even as an avid Dynasty Warriors fan I can tell you that it's pretty much a niche audience at this point…and most of that niche is Asian.

So what can Nintendo do? Well it can do the one thing they promised they wouldn't do.

Hard Reset

Nintendo is known for the hardware revisions, this can either be a good or a bad thing depending on the hardware in question. Personally the GBA to the GBA SP is a great revision because it fixed a ton of the hardware problems associated with the GBA such as the dark screen and the need for batteries. But on the same hand I think the DS Phat to DS Lite revision was poor because not enough changed for my liking. DS Lite to DSi was a nothing change and DSi to DSi XL was just a money grab if I've ever seen one. So for Nintendo to do 3DS to 3DS Lite this early means that the new 3DS would need to be a fucking BEAST if they don't want people with pitchforks and torches demanding Iwata's head.

The rumors already fly out there that they want to move away from the 3D aspect of it but you know what? I want them to make 3D mandatory in game development. Leave the switch on there for the visually impaired but similar to how they treated the DS when it first launched they need to put out some memo to everyone with a dev kit that says this.

"Your game better fucking use 3D in some meaningful away or else we will send Miyamoto over to fuck you in the face with a syringe full of botfly larvae and lemon juice."

Well…not exactly like that. It'd be in Japanese.

But the point still stands. The way the DS's power was unlocked is that they pretty much held a gun to everyone's head and MADE them find a way to make the touch screen work. So for the new 3DS they need to crank up the 3D (make it a simple on/off switch instead of a slider) and force them to make it work. You know that ridiculous add on for Monster Hunter and Resident Evil that gives them the extra thumb disc? Make that shit just a part of the console and make the screens wider to accommodate it.

Also that battery life? Fix that shit. When your console has less life than the iPhone—the main competitor to the 3DS and the Vita—then you have some problems. The price point can stay the same because I think the price that it is now is what it should've launched at.

But even with these minor changes it doesn't buck the trend that Nintendo is having a problem trying to find and capture and audience. The one thing they will need, and the one thing Nintendo will ABSOLUTELY need to fix and change is the one thing Nintendo just can't seem to do right at all.

Online capability.

No, it dosen't.

The DSi store is a joke. The 3DS eShop is an even bigger joke. The main reason that iPhone is having Nintendo's cake and eating it too is because they App Store is just wonderful for the types of bite sized entertainment people look for.

This isn't some new idea that was just made, PSP tried it before and it failed there as well. But Nintendo HAS the means, the developers, the development cycles and more importantly THE NAME VALUE to make this work.

Are you going to tell me that you wouldn't want to have a Pokémon game that you downloaded for 1.99 or even 5.99 (I've rarely seen a game app cost that much unless it's a port) that gave you full online capability to trade and battle on top of a nice little bite sized package? Or how about a downloadable full functioning Mario game that got new levels released with updates? Hell, it doesn't even have to be Nintendo properties. The App Store makes TONS of bank off of games that indy people like you and I make. Angry Birds, Tiny Wings, Square Ball…all of these could work on a 3DS, even possibly better IN 3D. But Nintendo would have to get the online right because in my eyes that is the thing that is killing them right now

Not the lack of new games and ideas.

Not the hardware problems.

Not the fact that Nintendo Magic isn't working.

It's the fact that the iPhone (and by extension the Android based phones) have run away with the handheld gaming market.

Don't look at me like that. I mean it, they run away with it. The handheld gamer no longer wants those 10 hour epics that they will play on the bus or on the toilet. They don't want those games where it feels like the console experience on a handheld. There is still a market for them, sure, but that can be said for every game under the sun. People still play DWARF FORTRESS for shits sake.

Meanwhile if you walk into a store right now and buy let's say…Peggle. You'd pay anywhere from 15-20 dollars for it on the DS. But on the iPhone it would be 1.99 for the same full functioned game. People who want the handheld games eat that shit UP.

Impulse buying of games is like crack. Impulse buying of GOOD games is like crack cut with heroin. And Impulse buying Crack cut with Heroin beats the shit out of Nintendo Magic any day of the week.

So that is what Nintendo needs to do. How hopeful am I that will Nintendo will do it? I'm not very hopeful. I think Nintendo will do the hardware revision they said they won't do and at that point just coast until the Wii U and hope for the best. I think Nintendo will somehow make Nintendo Magic work in the long run (again, probably with Kid Icarus) which will give them a monetary stay of execution. But Nintendo will miss the one vital component that will creep back in to hurt them like it did with the GameCube.

Like it did with the DS.

Like it did with the Wii.

Nintendo needs to break the cycle…and they had better do it now with the 3DS before it becomes a potential business breaker with the Wii U.

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And there you have it. Another Anti-Nintendo Anti-3DS rant. And you know what? I promise it's my LAST one of the year. This year has been pretty much nothing but me coming to terms with my hate/disappointment with Nintendo and I just don't feel like talking about it. So you know what? Next issue (notice I didn't say next week? I will talk about something else. Something completely unrelated to Nintendo. In fact…it has more in common with this man than anything.

Until next time, I'm Jordan Williams…and COMMENCE THE WIG SPLITTING! until Orton wins the title back at HIAC anyway