I’m going to come right out and say it; it’s time for Nintendo to hang it up in the hardware department and focus on software. Sure, they started the motion control phase of gaming (for better or worse) with the Wii. But even that was arguably outdone by the two gorillas in the gaming hardware room with the Kinect and Move. Now they are on the cusp of releasing their next piece of “revolutionary” hardware with the Wii U. While the two screen idea is certainly a neat concept, it’s ultimately a gimmick that will lure in the curious but pass by the majority of gamers. Why do we need Batman: Arkham City Armored Edition? That game came out a year ago and played just fine on two other consoles and PC without a second screen to manage one’s inventory. It’s more of a forced edition to a game in order sell a piece of hardware. Sure ZombieU might be interesting and make some fun use of the second screen but is it really something that couldn’t have been accomplished on a single screen? Especially when one considers the size and quality of most people’s gaming screen these days.
Nintendo is becoming that kid you went to school with that everyone paid attention to when they brought their new toy in but soon forgot about when the novelty wore off. So the kid brings in yet another toy and lavishes in the attention of his peers. Rinse and repeat enough times and the kids becomes the boy who cried wolf. Look gamers, motion controls! Sick of those? How about a second screen and motion graphics? Wait! Come back and play with me!
[aditude-amp id="flyingcarpet" targeting='{"env":"staging","page_type":"article","post_id":693914,"post_type":"story","post_chan":"none","tags":null,"ai":false,"category":"none","all_categories":"gbunfiltered,","session":"A"}']Had enough of my crappy metaphors yet? Me too.
What I’m ultimately driving at is that Nintendo needs to stop coming up with gimmicky hardware and start capitalizing on the love that most gamers have for their staple franchises. Let’s just imagine that they open the gates and allow their core franchises to be published for Xbox and PS3. There is a tremendous back catalog of games that could be sold through XBLA and PSN. I can guarantee that most gamers would buy no less than three of these games and probably more like most of them. Super Mario Brothers 3 alone would likely produce millions in revenue. Not to mention Super Metroid, most of the NES and SNES Zelda games, and Mario Kart. Even if Nintendo kept the latest iterations of these franchises as exclusives to thier own hardware, they could rake in revenue from the millions of gamers that love these games but don’t own one of their systems.
To illustrate my point, let’s do some math. In January of this year Microsoft reveled that some 66 million Xbox 360’s had been sold to date. While some percent of these had to be replacement units, let’s say that there are 50 million active today (probably a very conservative guess given that this data was released six months ago). Now let’s say that Nintendo releases Super Mario Brothers 3 on XBLA for a modest price of $7.99. I don’t know about you, but I would certainly pay that to have this classic on my hard drive, and so would most gamers I know. But again, let’s be conservative and say just 10% of our 50 million Xbox 360 owners pick it up. That’s 5,000,000 buyers paying $7.99 each. That’s $39,950,000 in sales. Forty million dollars off of one game that was originally released 22 years ago! I’m not even including the additional sales that could be generated from the percent of buyers that own 50 million or so Playstaion 3's. Conservatively, we’re talking about 100 million plus customers potentially waiting to give Nintendo money for their enormous back catalog of exclusive games.
Just how enormous? There are at least ten console Super Mario games that could receive the XBLA/PSN treatment, eight or so Zelda games, five Metroid games, and a slew of other exclusive titles that have never graced the circuitry of another brand’s console. If Nintendo would just do the math on this I can’t see how they could make any other choice but to port these games over and to do it now. We’re literally talking about billions of dollars in potential revenue for games that would require a minimal investment in order to be sold and function on XBLA and PSN. Frankly, Nintendo needs to wise up to this soon. The days of the console and the exclusive title are likely limited. Every year we creep closer to cutting the tether that ties our media to hardware. It’s already happened with movies and music and it’s inevitable that it will happen with gaming.
Trust me, Nintendo, it’s time to bring your beloved exclusives to all consoles and reap the vast rewards that await you. Keep making all the gimmicky hardware that your heart desires. Keep the latest installments of your flagships on Wii U if you want. But give me the classics for a reasonable price on XBLA and PSN and I guarantee you that it will be long time before you see another fiscal year end with a loss.