The death of Nintendo

I am going to go on record here with a bold statement - Nintendo will go bust within the next 10 years.

I know what you are all thinking - I must be off my rocker! The company that made the best selling games console of the last 20 years are going to be bankrupt, thats just bizarre!

Well there is method to my madness, and I shall attempt to explain it now.

In the current generation of video games consoles, you have 3 choices - PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Nintendo Wii. My personal preference is the PS3. The 360, while not appealing to me one iota (see note 1), is still a viable console and not the subject of my ire. Nope, that is all reserved for the Wii.

You see, if you rewind to 20 years ago, Nintendo was top of the pile, just as it is now. They had the NES, which had the majority share of the market. Back then, video games were a niche market, however. The main demographic for them were teenage boys. Sure, there were some adults, and girls, that played them, but it was mainly hormone-ridden, testosterone fueled adolescent males that made up the bulk of the consumer.

The mere idea back then of having more than one games console in your house was ludicrous, so people were forced to pick one, and stick to it. This trend actually continued for years, I believe right up until the previous generation of PS2's and Gamecubes.

As the 90s wore on, Nintendo released the Super Nintendo, which only really faced competition from the Sega MegaDrive, and even then the mighty Nintendo machine rolled onward.

It wasn't until around 1995-6 that Nintendo made their first misjudgment. We all know the story of how Nintendo went into business with Sony to create a CD-Rom adapter for their SNES, and how Nintendo didn't like the way it was going and so pulled out, leaving Sony to take everything they had learned to create the first PlayStation. Nintendo decided to stick with cartridges for their SNES successor, the N64.

While by no means a commercial failure, Nintendo failed to recognise the threat that Sony posed with their new CD-Rom console, and as a result they lost out on sales to the cheaper and technologically superior PSX, even losing Final Fantasy, a franchise that had been one of their biggest sellers on the NES and SNES.

It has taken them over 10 years to reclaim their place atop the videogame throne. The GameCube came and went, and the Wii was born.

Throughout their tenure, even when losing out to PSX and PS2, Nintendo still had hardcore fans. Franchises like Mario and Zelda, as well as third party developed games like GoldenEye and Banjo-Kazooie, were always big sellers. They managed to survive comfortable due to this hardcore fanbase, as well as their domination of the handheld market with their Gameboy Advance and Nintedo DS series.

When the Wii was announced, people started to question Nintendo's judgment once again. The console was seeming to do everything it could to alienate the hardcore gaming community that had supported Nintendo throughout the less successful years of N64 and Gamecube. The Wii as it stands now is a child's toy. It has sold a large number of units to people who have never played games before. Grandma's and under 5's can now play together, leaving the hardcore former fan base to defect to either Xbox or PS3.

It wasn't just the gamers that saw what was happening either. Rare, one of the top 3rd party developers that had been with Nintendo for years, did what Squaresoft chose to do years ago, and jumped ship.

One of the issues affecting this growth is that the number of games bought for the Wii is significantly less that one would expect given the number of console sales. The reason for this, I speculate, is that once Granny and Little Timmy have their shiny new Wii, it comes with Wii Sports, which is the game that these people play. They don't need to spend more money on the new Metroid/Mario/Smash Bros/Zelda games, because they won't play them.

The main exception to this is Wii Fit, as although it is sold as a game seperate from the Wii, once it has been purchased, no more games are needed. Wii Fit + Wii Sports is all that will ever be needed.

That's not to say that no hardcore gamers own a Wii, many do. Not many own just a Wii, however. They may have a Wii and an Xbox, or a Wii and a PS3, but either way once thing is certain - they do not class the Wii as their main console. They chose to buy a PS3 or an Xbox, and the Wii was a cheap backup to use for the 1 or 2 occasional good games or to entertain younger siblings/girlfriends or to use at parties.

This may not paint such a bleak picture for Nintendo, as I'm sure they couldn't give a toss whether the people who buy their consoles are gamers or grandmas. At the moment, they are right. Its the future that should worry them.

In 5 years time, more or less, Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo will release their successors to the current generation of consoles. Sony and Microsoft can rest assured that, assuming they both stick to what they know, they will sell consoles. The PS4 and Xbox720 or whatever they end up being called will be commercial successes.

Nintendo will have a tough choice to make. On one hand, they have the hardcore gamers that they so easily brushed aside with the Wii. Do they make a console for them? Or do they make a Wii version 2 to keep the Grannys happy?

Either way they are fucked. They no longer have a hardcore fanbase to cater for, as they have all jumped ship to Sony or Microsoft. Gamers are fickle creatures, and once you shun them it takes a miracle to get them back. The only way they could do it is if each new Nintendo console was free.

As for the grannies and kiddies (I refuse to use the phrase "casual gamers" as it makes me want to gag at the mere idea), this road is no less bumpy. The problem here will be the same as the current one regarding games. They don't need anything new. Why would they spend money to buy another console when they can still sit around and play Wii Sports and Wii Fit? They aren't going to.

So Nintendo's next console will be a flop. It will most certainly be a worse seller than the N64. They will go into administration and end up bankrupt or being bought out by Sony or Microsoft.

It's like when a really good band decides to change their sound to appeal to a new audience, whilst pissing off the current fans who thought their old sound was perfectly fine, kinda like Green Day did with American Idiot. It's great when it happens but when everyone gets off the bandwagon and moves on to some other band, changing your musical style back to how it used to be won't work because you've lost all your fans already.

The motion sensor gimmick is their best friend right now, but it will stab them in the back in the future.

Anyways, thats my rant for this time, peace out and if you actually read this then please comment, whether you agree or disagree or have no opinion.









(Writer's note 1)
Just a quick note to explain why I dislike the Xbox. First, the controller feels uncomfortable to hold in my opinion.
Second, there are no exclusives that appeal to me. 90% of games are available on PS3 as well, and the ones that aren't are generic first-person shooters.