What Do We Want From WiiWare?
June 30th, 2007, 2:19pm by GeoffHere’s a subject for debate: GameSetWatch asks what we want from WiiWare, Nintendo’s new tool for original DLC. To start things off, I’ll suggest that these are the top three things Nintendo needs to do in order to make WiiWare a viable alternative to Xbox Live.
- Provide an open forum for developers to create their own Wii games as they see fit. That means that Nintendo can’t put its thumb on the scales to limit developers’ options, as it often does (see, for example, the nanny mentality that led to Friend codes or no-blood Mortal Kombat). Let people create whatever they want to create, as long as it meets basic quality requirements. This also means aggressively pursuing outside IP to prevent Microsoft and Sony from locking it up… Flow would have been a good addition to the Wii lineup, if Nintendo had been better prepared and more aggressive.
- Be careful leveraging Nintendo IP for new DLC. Nintendo’s biggest advantage over Microsoft is the fact that it has so many recognizable brands… but if it just churns out more crappy minigames, people are going to wonder why the hell they’re paying full price for more Mario Party. Nintendo also needs to distinguish between new WiiWare games and its own historical library - I’d much rather play a new Alien Hominid game than try to remember why I bothered re-purchasing Blaster Master.
- Price appropriately. I already think Nintendo’s Wii pricing is lousy, and $8 is the most I’ll pay for almost any older game. But if they think WiiWare is an opportunity to sucker their fanboys for a few extra dollars’ profit, (I hope) they’re mistaken. Please don’t try to rip me off.
Your thoughts?
Update: By the way, I completely agree with MattG’s comments on the GSW page. I can play Flash games for free on a computer; they’re a good diversion but they’re not really worth my time or money. Nintendo had better not just port 3-minute minigames or they’re going to be in trouble.
Posted in Nintendo, Wii, Geoff, Xbox Live |
June 30th, 2007 at 8:21 pm
Flash games generally suck, I hate retarded websites like addictinggames.com. They’re not worth your time and money, you’re right, but they’re also not a “good diversion.”
From item one on your list, I’ll give you friend codes as “nanny-like” but the no blood mortal combat thing was completelynecessary (even if a bit excessive) given the circumstances.
From items two and three on your list, you again miss the point that Virtual Console is aimed at people who never owned the original game or have since lost the ability to play the original game (through selling it, loosing it, a breakdown of the console or cartrige, etc.). If you own the original Blaster Master and an operable console, I’m beginning to wonder why you bothered re-purchsing it too. A game is obviously worth a lot more to someone who’s never played it or really loves it. I personally would have no problem paying the $10 for Starfox 64 from VC if I didn’t have the cartrige and operable N64 like I do because that is one of the best games I ever played on N64.
June 30th, 2007 at 8:23 pm
Other than that, you seem to have it down. Sorry, I forgot to add that in the last post.
June 30th, 2007 at 8:36 pm
FX-1 -
1.) Can you clarify exactly why Mortal Kombat’s lack of blood was “necessary”? The Genesis version had blood… and I have yet to be murdered in my sleep by the psychopaths that it spawned.
2.) My point on the Virtual Console is not that Nintendo shouldn’t keep it, but that there needs to be a real distinction between the Virtual Console (old Nintendo games) and those games that are created as part of WiiWare (new titles). If that distinction blurs, then there’s a problem.
I’d also point out that there’s a lot of evidence that the most popular games on the VC (A Link to the Past, for example) are indeed games which are re-purchased, sometimes multiple times, by people that already own the original. In fact, I’d go so far as to state that nostalgia is driving a significant fraction, if not the majority, of the repurchases out there.
June 30th, 2007 at 10:06 pm
Not exactly necessay I guess, but understandable. Given the government issue and disorder in content that was growing more chaotic before the formation of the ESRB, I’d say they were just trying to make a reasonably safe move which, in this case, there’s nothing wrong with. All those people who say the Genesis version was way better because it had blood are probably crazy, but I’ve never played original Mortal Kombat so I don’t know for sure, it just seems odd. It’s easy in hindsight to say that no psychotic killers were created out of Mortal Kombat but I think in their position, it made sense to do what they did and it couldn’t have really hurt the game that much.
July 1st, 2007 at 12:34 am
FX-1:
I completely agree that the Genesis version was far inferior to the SNES one. There are very few people, especially at this point, that would disagree.
But the way the game plays is not the issue at hand here. Perhaps it was a “reasonably safe move”, but I disagree that “there’s nothing wrong” it. Nintendo was worried about it’s family-friendly image and so decided to play nanny, which is exactly what they’re doing now with Manhunt 2, along with Sony (and Microsoft too, if Manhunt 2 were being released for their platform), just for slightly different reasons.
I should note that I’m fairly certain that all following Mortal Kombat games for the SNES contained blood. While the SNES version of MK was clearly superior to the Genesis version, I think the Genesis version still outsold it significantly.
July 1st, 2007 at 10:08 pm
Yes, all later MK games on the SNES contained blood, beginning with MKII, after all the bad publicity generated from the first game. Apparently that’s a lesson that’s been lost.
July 1st, 2007 at 10:38 pm
guys, just ignore FX-1. He’s not worth it.
July 2nd, 2007 at 9:26 am
Shut up laesperanzapaz. What, because I have actual opinions on these kind of things rather than going around with this overly neutral attitude that everyone seems to think is right and pretend everything is okay? For heavens sake! I made a stupid comment. Get over it. I thought it made sense at the time maybe I wasn’t thinking straight, I don’t know. But if there’s anyone here we should ignore, it’s the guy that says we should ignore other people.