OPINION : Nintendo continues to adjust an good example for excellence and longevity in the play populace . The likes of EA Sports and Activision could learn a lot from the house Mario and Link build .
There ’s are a slew of reasons Nintendo has enjoy such longevity in the gambling world . But patience and persistence , is at the forefront of everything the company does .
While original gambling goliath like Sega , Atari , and Commodore have waned , Nintendo has stood the test of time and bear on to expand – arguably as gaming ’s crown precious stone .
Nintendo is never in a hurry . It ’s never desperate to progress to the next thing . It has the ultimate faith in both its hardware , software , its loyal fan understructure , and that impalpable conjuration that continues to enamour newfangled generations .
There are no knee - jerk reactions when things do n’t go as well because the company ’s mostly unmatched armoury of intellectual property never disappoints . 2023 was another year where this attack paid off in spades .
While Microsoft was engaged wrangling over the $ 79 billion putsch of Activision Blizzard and consolidating ownership of a key developer , and Sony was busy fighting against it , Nintendo quietly pop off about its commercial enterprise .
There was noSwitch 2or Switch Pro , as many expected during 2023 . That ’s despite the Switch approaching seven year old and look emphatically second rate in terms of the technology underpinning the platform .
For Nintendo , it ’s never been about receive the fastest or the best looking for , it ’s been about providing the most piquant and enjoyable experience its gameplay design have enabled .
In 2023 Nintendo light back on two old campaigners , the august Mario and Link . Tears of the Kingdomdelivered on the sequel to one of the most loved Legend of Zelda games ever . Super Mario Wondergave the citizenry what they want – an updated version of the game the original cabinet gamers fell in love with 35 year ago . And that was enough .
There ’s are a few coeval who could learn a thing or two from that . Namely , the like of EA Sports and Activision Blizzard , who insist on releasing novel versions of the same tired franchise every class with diminishing issue .
Could n’t EA Sports have waited a year before unfreeze the firstEA Sports FCgame ? Would n’t the gap in the kinship with FIFA have play a natural chance to take stock ? To actually come up with some meaningful innovations to a game that really has n’t changed all that much in recent storage ?
The less said about Madden NFL 24 , and its 1.3 medium gamer score from Metacritic substance abuser , the well .
Would it really anguish for Activision to have a twelvemonth off with Call of Duty , as was rumoured a lilliputian while back , or else of yet another underwhelming Modern Warfare release ?
The annual release grind
I know the strains of the business enterprise modelling for these developers and publishers need the annual releases and that cursory gamers continue to buy them in huge issue .
But certainly there ’s a case for giving the development teams a class off the dweeb of yearly releases when the franchises themselves are going backwards by way of stagnancy ? At this point , it ’s still profitable . At this point the licensing rules all . But how long before before there ’s a better option ?
Would a year without an EA Sports football secret plan really go wrong ? EA has a great opportunity to make us unrestrained about football games yet again , now it is loose from the restrictions of the FIFA licence .
I ’m not talk about six long time between mainline passing , as was the font with The Legend of Zelda , but would 2 - 3 years without a new FIFA game go amiss , in this day an age where a unproblematic software update can update squads and kit ?
perchance if that was the case , we would n’t see the annual game on sales agreement for twenty quid two month after loss ? possibly then the game could have a short value like Nintendo ’s do ? Maybe there would be some rightful expectation ? This about what these ultra talented talented people producing these games in a subspecies against time could achieve if they were given a couple of years
The games that continue to make wave operate on the premise that less is more . In 2023 , the likes of Baidur ’s Gate 3 , Diablo 4 , Street Fighter 6 , Marvel ’s Spider - Man 2 direct the plaudits . These might be sequels , but they ’re craft with punctilious care over half a decennium at least . In some cases , they ’ve been reimagined to make us fall in love all over again .
The ilk of EA Sports and Activision Blizzard would do well to take a few notes from Nintendo ’s book in 2024 .
