Nintendo Online

[strat_ax]

A confirmation that Nintendo is heavily investing a lot on their online.
http://www.cube-europe.com/news.php?nid=7645

Finally, the company has been woken up and realize that online support is must at this day and age!

 

[Guden Oden]

Death to AOL; bring on NOL!

 

[strat_ax]

Death to AOL; bring on NOL!

LOL for some reason, I can't help myself checking IM on my DS after this comment.

 

[Acert93]

Nintendo has been active in online for a long time. With the SuperFamcom they did online horse gambling in Japan.

Retrospectively I think Nintendo made a wise decision not making online a major selling point this gen. I don't agree with HOW they went about portraying it, but looking at the market: MS has done VERY well with LIVE!, but they have like 1.4M customers after 3 years. That is only a 15% penetration. Online is a plus on the PS but the quality has issues.

If you look at Nintendo's GCN customers my guess is a lot of them are not your hard core online gamer (I wish they were of course).

NOW seems like the time to hit broadband. Like 50M people signed up this year and worldwide 165M people are online. Official projections are for 215M broadband subscribers by the end of 2005. Nintendo has no lost much if they push broadband hard from here on out. It will take time to get into the same league as MS (LIVE is really good), but they seem to be embracing the technology at the right time. This gen online was a niche (a very cool one that I love), next gen it will be very important strategically.

They always said they would be online when they saw it being a viable business model. Seeing as more and more people are online and expect it as a basic feature, it just became a viable business model

 

[Qroach]

Nintendo had contradictory reasons for not having online support in their products.

They at one time stated that they didn't see it as profitable, while at the same time saying that people shouldn't have to pay to play online games. I think it was a poor choice they didn't hop with the online bandwagon when they could have. As they will have an uphill battle with online services from MS and SONY that will be in a much more mature and stable state.

 

[StefanS]

Nintendo had contradictory reasons for not having online support in their products.

They at one time stated that they didn't see it as profitable, while at the same time saying that people shouldn't have to pay to play online games. I think it was a poor choice they didn't hop with the online bandwagon when they could have. As they will have an uphill battle with online services from MS and SONY that will be in a much more mature and stable state.

I think their choice limited some of their games as Animal Crosing would have been the perfect online game...

 

[Qroach]

That's a good point.

 

[Evil_Cloud]

Nintendo had contradictory reasons for not having online support in their products.

They at one time stated that they didn't see it as profitable, while at the same time saying that people shouldn't have to pay to play online games. I think it was a poor choice they didn't hop with the online bandwagon when they could have. As they will have an uphill battle with online services from MS and SONY that will be in a much more mature and stable state.

I think their choice limited some of their games as Animal Crosing would have been the perfect online game...

That's why Animal Crossing DS is online.

 

[cthellis42]

"Penetration" is no the importart part. "Presence" is. "Competitiveness" is. By being lax on online games, they've basically been sending forth the attitude that they really don't care what Sony or Microsoft are up to--that they don't care how immensely cool some of their games would have been with online play or how many gamers want it--they just "can't be bothered." They already HAVE the equipment to go online, and it does get used with a few games, so I imagine many people are crying "WHY IN HELL DIDN'T THEY TAKE AN EXTRA WEEK TO STICK ONLINE MULTIPLAYER IN MARIO KART?"

Most people don't know how long it takes, you see, but are quite willing to think that anyway.

Embracing multiplayer even in just key games where it would have the most effect would be all they really needed to have gamers sit up and take notice. It increases the longevity of the games, the visability and competitiveness of their console, the interest in new sequels with it added... Considering just how much cash Nintendo is sitting on top of, how hard would it have been to add online multiplayer to a dozen key titles even just to PS2 levels? To toss a bit more support to certainly publishing houses to get their games online as well? The answer is "none at all."

Also, most importantly, it builds a foundation and gives them the experience to make online connectivity BETTER next generation, but whereas Microsoft has built a recognizable service and Sony has gotten its hands into games all over the spectrum, Nintendo has shrugged its shoulders. They automatically start next generation in a lower gear.

If "penetration" were all that really mattered, shouldn't they have given up on the GameCube in general? I mean it probably only amounts to 15% or less of the current console generation, right?

There's no two ways I can go about thinking their lack of even MINIMAL online support is anything but a mistake. It may not be "as profitable as they'd like" but it IS profitable, it is nothing but an enhancement for their console, their competition has it, and it IS the future of gaming. Why limit themselves?

 

[Qroach]

I subscribe to your news.

 

[Qroach]

I can recall when GC launched and i told people how nintendo wasn't serious about online for the gamecube. It caused a stampede on my head.

Well if they are serious about it now, they have a long way to go. even then I won't be suprised if they are serious for only internal games and not 3rd party games.

 

[Ooh-videogames]

I remember watching a interview with Reggie on Gamespy, where he mentions it was mistake not going online this gen, but their going full steam ahead on the Revolution and DS.

 

[Ty]

Nintendo has been active in online for a long time. With the SuperFamcom they did online horse gambling in Japan.

Heck you could do banking online with the Famicom (NES).

 

[strat_ax]

Nintendo had contradictory reasons for not having online support in their products.

They at one time stated that they didn't see it as profitable, while at the same time saying that people shouldn't have to pay to play online games. I think it was a poor choice they didn't hop with the online bandwagon when they could have. As they will have an uphill battle with online services from MS and SONY that will be in a much more mature and stable state.

I think their choice limited some of their games as Animal Crosing would have been the perfect online game...

That's why Animal Crossing DS is online.

Don't foger that their major franchise Pokemon (PERL/DIAMOND) will also be online.

I wonder if SEGA will follow up with another Phantasy Star online.

 

[wco81]

Is MS making money from XBL subscriptions?

Do develpers/publishers realized enough incremental sales from online to justify whatever it cost them to add online support?

Personally, I like online games a lot but I'm not convinced most gamers will go online or if they do, they will stick with it. I think a lot of gamers like the idea of online, that a game they buy has the feature if it's there. But a lot of them never get around to it.

So beyond this mindshare, it's not clear there's a profitable business model beyond the handful of MMO games which have garnered a big enough and loyal following.

I've chided Nintendo, not because of marketshare concern but because by rejecting online, they denied themselves a chance to innovate in online genres. Think about the comparative impact of Mario 64 vs. Mario Sunshine. The first brought the platformer to 3D and introduced new gameplay elements and control mechanics. The second was more of the same.

If anyone could have made an online platformer interesting, it might have been Nintendo. Or various other genres which have really not been explored online. Instead, they gave you a bunch of split-screen or quad-screen multiplayer games.

When they half-heartedly put out the broadband adapter, they didn't have any games supporting it. So no third parties bothered to support it either, even EA, which continued to support the GC after others had stopped and which had an online infrastructure already, to which they might have plugged in GC versions of their games.

 

[Qroach]

I totally agree with you, however there's one point about EA that not many people knew. EA didn't have an online infrastructure, they used gamespy like most other PS2 developers, as the choice of using the Sony online tools was less then desireable, and it was cheaper to pay someone to support your game instead of building the infrastructure yourself.

 

[Evil_Cloud]

I totally agree with you, however there's one point about EA that not many people knew. EA didn't have an online infrastructure, they used gamespy like most other PS2 developers, as the choice of using the Sony online tools was less then desireable, and it was cheaper to pay someone to support your game instead of building the infrastructure yourself.

Sony themselves also rely on third parties for a part of their infrastructure, such as Sega.

 

[Qroach]

yeah, I remember somone teaming up with sega, but I didn't recall whom.

 

[wco81]

EA used GAmespy for Battlefield and other PC games. But the EA Sports games seem to have their own servers.

I know before consoles went online, they had EA Football Net for the PC versions of Madden.

Given EA's reluctance to use outside tools, it seems they wouldn't use Gamespy unless they had to. To use Gamespy, don't you have to kick them a per-title license to them?

 

[Tagrineth]

Don't foger that their major franchise Pokemon (PERL/DIAMOND) will also be online.

I wonder if SEGA will follow up with another Phantasy Star online.

Pokémon Perl, eh?

That'd probably be a hell of a complex game.


Sega IS making a "PSO ep.4", by the way.