Nintendo - A Point of View

By Freedan

When i was growing up, they were the games platform for me, mario, zelda, etc, this was the one for me. I'd started off with a Vic 20, and an amiga, that my older brother would let me play on from time to time, and around the age of 7-8 , i finally got my own Nes, and its basically gone on from there. But now, 10 years later, having been through the snes, n64 and now gamecube, along with the various other game and virtual boys, have Nintendo finally lost it?

Through the early 90s i'm sure most people assosciated games with Nintendo and likewise. But ever since the N64, things seem to have been slipping for the big N , even in the eyes of many Nintendo fanboys. Through that generation, unlike Sony and Sega, they stuck to carts, which from a piracy point of view was wise for them personally, but from a price stance, they were a whole lot more expensive, one of many problems , and possibly bad decisions.

There are many arguements as to why Nintendo lost the battle with this generation, all with valid points. People say piracy made the Playstation, and yes, many points from this arguement i do agree with, practically everyone i knew had a chipped playstation, and only bought it cause they knew they could get games for a couple of pounds, or dollars. This obviously helped them build up the user base and how they built on this with the playstation 2, which currently has about 75% of the market share. But i'm getting sidetracked here..

Of course theres also the cartridge factor, they lost a lot of good 3rd party support because of this, Square were one of the main franchises that were tempted away with the prospect of working with the greater amount of space available on cds. Plus like i mentioned, the price factor played into it too.

Now with this generation, sega have already bowed out and become software only, something many people, myself included, hope is only a temporary measure, because during the n64 disappointment, i started to stray from them and got myself a mega drive, and a playstation, and eventually became a bit of a sega fanboy. Xbox has entered with some impressive hardware has entered bankrolled by Microsofts billions, and like i mentioned , Sony with the PS2 continue to dominate with 3/4 of the market. But what for Nintendo?

Nintendo originally had almost the whole of the market, in the days of the nes, to round about 10, barely 15% of the market, and if reports are to be believed, slowly giving up ground to the xbox, or maybe even have been surpassed by the Xbox. Admittedly Nintendo are still turning a pretty heft profit, 100s of millions, while Microsoft have been turning about the same as a loss. But thats the price you have to pay these days to join the race.

But what have Nintendo been doing to lose so much? And how are they turning around this? Well being in Europe like you should already know, i'm used to being screwed over by the European branch of Nintendo, NOE regularly delay, dumb down, and just plain not release things over here. Final Fantasys were never released until number 7 debuted on the playstation. Harvest Moon on Snes and N64 were converted but they were too lazy to bother releasing. Often they may get released in a pal format, over in Australia, but with me being round the other side of world, doesnt help me much when i wanna get my hands on a copy. These days tho, I've begun to follow the route many before me have took, and which , thanks to the wonders of the internet, has become a much easier and cheaper route to take. Importing. A very simple process of simply getting these games from other teritories, either america or japan. Of course you'll require something to run these games, either an imported system, or modify it somehow, universal converters have been around for many a year. Nintendo have even allowed the Freeloader, a Universal converter for the gamecube, to be released.

But now NOE at least have finally decided to do something about this, and in short screw us over once again. Now Nintendo have, at least NOE have decided that we cant go about doing this either. They are now attacking and shutting down importers and trying to force them to no longer stock Nintendo games from other territories. What purpose does this serve? Sure when we import we divert money that would go to NOE to NOA instead, but its all 1 big company, does it really matter so much?

Some people such as myself i'm sure wouldnt mind buying European only, i mean all they have to do is convert it to PAL from NTSC, i realise there will be some problems, but surely its not that hard to shorten the release dates to within a month or two of the US release? They do it with dvds quite easily these days, why not games? But what about those who simply prefer for example Japanese games, i have met several people who as they've grown older, sold their entire collection and replaced it with all NTSC-J games, which often have extra features in, or a slightly different style, with such a difference in tastes between mainstream eastern and western cultures. And of course then theres those games who simply dont get released even stateside, some european only, etc. For instance Final Fantasy V on the super nintendo, sure it was eventually ported onto the playstation, but there are several games that publishers and developers will never get around to porting. If theres a game that really appeals to you, yet will never be released, what other method do you have of playing the game other than importing. Its not like you can move to that country just to play the game...

So once again it seems that Nintendo have made a poor move. Someone on a forum i often go to had a very good idea that i think Nintendo should consider, perhaps its time to dissolve the European arm and start over again. Because even if NOE make every right decision for the next year, their image has been badly damaged, even among the casual gamer...