Nintendo's Renaissance

[Relix]

BOTW and Odyssey are massive steps, fundamental changes Nintendo hasn't done since the 64 days. It's reinventing their classics and launching them into new heights. Huge, ambitious games with loads of fun, listening to fan feedback but maintaining its classic essence. What triggered this change in Nintendo? Consider the scope of 3D World and Odyssey. It's huge! Same goes from the awkward and boxed in Skyward Sword to the open world of BOTW. It's like Nintendo itself has had a reinassance for the past two years that has just gone into overdrive, all along the Switch, their best console in over a decade. If this is the expected output for big Nintendo games down the road I am utterly excited. Imagine Prime... A new Donkey Kong.. The next freaking Zelda. My mind just melts. I know there are smaller projects, but even Yoshi looks wonderful. Arms was a fantastic side project that I loved.

The switch is so different from all their previous products, just forward thinking. Yes, it's not a strong as the big consoles but it doesn't need to be right now, and with the possibility of an iterative approach in the next years the possibility is endless. They finally have a modern foundation to work their magic and also invite indies and third parties. No longer held back by the old PPC architecture of the freaking GameCube, and using modern shading techniques and apis.

Is this the effect of Nintendo letting a younger generation take over? Or is Nintendo as a whole just becoming more open? I for one am giddy as fuck just thinking about the possibilities, just hoping the release calendar and quality sticks for as long as possible.

 

[mrtl]

The Wii was a fundamental change as well. Except that one backfired when they announced a direct successor.

 

[Kyzer]

I hope Game Freak applies a new approach, as a big Pokemon fan I feel like it's been long enough that even they know it's time

 

[CanUKlehead]

New blood rising.

 

[xmassteps]

Thing I really like about Nintendo is that they're unafraid to fail. Even if they're not wholly successful all the time, they'll always try something new with their games and hardware.

 

[srhltmr]

Is this the effect of Nintendo letting a younger generation take over? Or is Nintendo as a whole just becoming more open?

Click to shrink...

I honestly think it's a bit of both. They can't be as insular as they've always been.

That being said, they still have some policies and ideas that need work.

 

[Redhead On Moped]

I don't completely agree with the intro of your second paragraph. I don't think Switch is so different from past consoles and handhelds, but rather an amalgamation of everything that came before it in a new form. There isn't a single Nintendo system that didn't contribute to the Switch it's almost like everything led to this. It's incredible.

 

[NinjaCoachZ]

I would argue that MK8, Splatoon, and Mario Maker have helped build up to this point. All those games I think had the real creative spark you can see really let loose on BOTW, Odyssey, etc. That plus feedback from games like 3D World, Skyward Sword, and here we are.

 

[Deleted member 4359]

The Wii U GPU was pretty modern, it's CPU was a G3 overclocked with two extra cores from 1998.

As for this post... yeah, they're just listening to feedback well and doing what they're doing.

 

[petethepanda]

Nintenaissance?

It really is an exciting time for Nintendo. I'm still not entirely convinced that the Switch will be something that changes the whole industry, but the games they're putting out are exciting in a way Nintendo's games haven't been for ages. Kind of unbelievable that we got such earth-shattering Zelda and Mario games within a year of each other.

 

[Ehoavash]

I hope their other studios/partners try to create a renaissance in their respective series too cough cough Hal Lab making the same-y kirby game, gamefreak being gamefreak, the NSMB series, so much more

 

[jph139]

I think there's a lot of factors. The failure of the Wii U, the restructuring under Iwata, the rise of the new guard, the overall industry shifts.

The last few years have been rocky as Nintendo tried to figure out what the next step should be. We're finally seeing the fruits of their experimentation during the last generation.

 

[New Fang]

I suspect a lot of this is the fruit of allowing the younger generation of developers inside Nintendo have a bigger role. There is an energy in many of these projects that is exciting to see.

 

[BGBW]

The real reason: They have dress-up elements!

Metroid Prime 4 will feature a top hat, tutu wearing Samus!

 

[dubsky]

I think it has to do with the steam from having a new CEO and getting a wake-up call from the Wii U.

 

[Zalman]

Breath of the Wild and Mario Odyssey were both led by the same directors and producers as the previous entries. When it comes to those games, I believe it's a coincidence they decided to shake things up at the same time. Splatoon and ARMS are both results of the younger developers stepping up.

 

[hotcyder]

I think since the DS they've always applied some blue ocean thinking, and a lot of that even applies to their earliest hit franchise like Mario, Zelda and Metroid. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't - but I guess maybe it's keeping an eye on trends and doing their own thing that has made BOTW and Odyssey big hits.

The real reason: They have dress-up elements!

Metroid Prime 4 will feature a top hat, tutu wearing Samus!

Click to shrink...

I also want to see the Dress-Up trend continue

 

[Deleted member 135]

I am really excited to get a Switch, but how is Super Mario Odyssey an evolution akin to BOTW? It's a 3D Mario game with a gimmick, just like Sunshine.

 

[NinjaCoachZ]

I think it has to do with the steam from having a new CEO and getting a wake-up call from the Wii U.

Click to shrink...

Most of the Switch's year 1 was planned by Iwata and Kimishima said they more-or-less stuck to those plans. Too bad he couldn't be here for all this. Totally agree on point 2 though.

 

[Extreme Tactician]

I think it has to do with the steam from having a new CEO and getting a wake-up call from the Wii U.

Click to shrink...

It can't be the first part. Kimishima is too new for anything significant to have changed.

 

[ned_ballad]

Nintendo's reaction to failure seems to be to just go wild and try all kinds of new stuff.

Look back at how they treated their franchises during the GCN era

- An action adventure Star Fox game (from the Banjo Kazooie guys!)
- A first person adventure Metroid (made by relative nobodies at the time)
- A Zelda with a fresh art style, taking place on multiple islands rather than having a large overworld
- Our first console Pokemon RPGs with compatibility with the GBA games
- The next 2D Donkey Kong game's primary controller method is a pair of bongos
- Mario in a tropical setting with a water jetpack
- Kirby's only game on the console was a racing game
- A four player Zelda

You also see third/second parties touching Nintendo games more
- A Namco made Star Fox game
- A Sega made F-Zero game
- Everyone under the sun making Mario sports games

Looking back, Twilight Princess, Double Dash, Animal Crossing and Melee were the most "normal" games on the system, and they were greatly outnumbered by experimental changes to series. And even Double Dash is debatable, since it was clearly intended to be experimental

We're seeing that happen again, except this time to much greater success.

 

[Soul Skater]

Yeah, it really felt to me that for the past 10 years or so, that Nintendo was always trying to find ways to simplify or strip down their main franchises in a number of ways in order to make their historically not entirely casual franchises palatable to the casual audience.

While there were obviously exceptions,and that no simplifying some game design elements wasn't always a bad thing and sometimes even lead to brilliant ideas or made things better.. It sucked because things felt like they were moving backwards.

For the first time in a long time it feels like Nintendo is willing to go "big", again and take their older franchises in push them in new bold directions rather than figure out how to appease the lowest common denominator.

I think things started to change behind the scenes around that time a few years ago where Miyamoto expressed frustrations with the new audience that the wii brought in. That they would play Wii Sports and maybe even NSMB, but wouldn't bother trying to go to the next level despite whatever attempts that they made. Things like he intro to SMG2 did nothing to bring people over even if you could tell they were trying to teach casual 2D mario players how to trasition to something with a bit more substance. Think that the magazine he did the interview with also mistranslated a quote calling casuals "pathetic" or something, which I remember people having a field day with.

 

[GCX]

It's obviously not the only factor but to me it seems like the big restructure of their studios in 2015 was a really good thing. The studios seem to be communicating with each other more and sharing knowledge, at least based on how not just one but many of the teams are coming up with amazing games.

 

[KINGOFSHIBUYA Ltd.]

Their success is based on the gimmick of their new console and games:

It plays games.

/s-ish


Seriously, being portable is not new. Motion controls aren't new. Touch screen isn't.
Their big thing now is that their games are good.
The rest is all icing.

This revolutionary message of "games are good" combined with portability is a hit with people.

Glad they finally come around to just making the games better rather than strange gimmicks.
DS pushed devs to reimagine games as being heavily touch reliant.
Wii forced waggle into games didn't need it or may not have benefited from it much.
Th Wii U's combination of gimmicks was so strange, Nintendo admitted before releasing Star Fox Zero that not even they had made a game that had justified it yet.

The Switch lets you play games in different places and makes it easier to play with other people. So basically the Famicom's gimmick combined that of the GameBoy.

The system sells on the quality of its games, rather than trying to be whacky or futuristic (looking at you, VR).

 

[Miamiwesker]

Zelda I agree is a massive change (it still needs proper dungeons to be what it can be) but Mario? Mario Odyssey is right in line with how Nintendo changes the gimmick of each mario game and it's clearly a take on the 64 formula.

Anyway I still think TP and Galaxy were better entries into their respected series than BOTW and Odyssey are. But the future is bright if they can go back to the tight well designed levels of those series while retaining new ideas they have introduced.

 

[Timeaisis]

Everyone is saying it started with BotW, but it started two years ago with Splatoon. It's new blood embracing new ideas.

 

[RobFox64tm]

I see the Switch as being like the Gamecube in terms of Nintendo trying new things, but the difference is that those "new things" are a lot more palatable this time. As cool as Wind Waker and Mario Sunshine were, you can't really argue that those aren't both pretty divisive games in their respective series. The changes in BotW and Odyssey are much more embraced by fans.

 

[LightEntite]

BOTW and Odyssey are massive steps, fundamental changes Nintendo hasn't done since the 64 days. It's reinventing their classics and launching them into new heights. Huge, ambitious games with loads of fun, listening to fan feedback but maintaining its classic essence. What triggered this change in Nintendo?

Click to shrink...

IMO?

The inability to do what they've always been doing without drawing criticism from the rest of the gaming world due to the progress of other game development studios

You can't look at games like Horizon, Gravity Rush, MGSV, ect. And still be wowed by a Zelda game that functions the way the previous 3 did.

 

[ned_ballad]

Another thing is that I think Nintendo does better without a gimmick to build around.

The Switch's gimmick is inherit. It's always on and a developer doesn't need to do anything to encourage users to use the gimmick.

When Nintendo develops games specifically for a gimmick, they seem to come out not great a lot of the time, more so in recent years than back during the Wii's hay day. Nintendo likes having their selling point be "this is a series you love, but this time using the console's gimmick!" and you end up with Star Fox Zero. This was a slump they were stuck in, and you can still see it peaking out in Zelda and Mario. Zelda was clearly designed to always have the Wii U gamepad to access the slate (which would have been annoying) and the motion puzzles are janky and not great. Mario has the rumble puzzles and some motion control that ends up not really being highlights of the game at all. I'm not really a fan of having to go to a menu and turn on rumble to solve one puzzle and then turn it back off because I hate rumble.

"What does having to shake the controller to roll/spin jump/jump higher/etc actually add to the game that enhances player's enjoyment?" is something Nintendo stopped asking themselves a decade ago and slowly sunk into a pit where use of a gimmick was more important than how the game felt when played. It was okay during the Wii days when the controller was specific for motion and regular controls were not used often, and the gimmicks amounted to minor stuff like waggle to roll, but the Wii U went back to regular controls but still wanted some of those Wii Gimmicks and it ended up being messy in places with stuff like Star Fox Zero where you just sit and ask yourself "why can't I just play this like a normal video game..."

It's actually pretty refreshing to be able to pick up a controller and just play a game without worrying about shaking it or turning it or getting off the couch to use a tablet like a telescope or whatever other stuff we had to deal with for the Wii U.

 

[Future Gazer]

Zelda I agree is a massive change (it still needs proper dungeons to be what it can be) but Mario? Mario Odyssey is right in line with how Nintendo changes the gimmick of each mario game and it's clearly a take on the 64 formula.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, I think people might be a little too caught up in the Odyssey hype at the moment. It's a wonderful take on the 64 formula but it doesn't really feel like some grand reinvention.

 

[RennerSage]

Nintendo is simply the best developer in the buisness when they really put their mind to a project

 

[scare_crow]

BOTW and Odyssey are massive steps, fundamental changes Nintendo hasn't done since the 64 days."

Click to shrink...

Zelda, definitely. But I think talk of Odyssey being a huge leap forward for Mario is overstated. It's a very/extremely good 3D Mario game and a good return to the more playground design, but to imply that it made as many radical changes as BOTW did is a little disingenuous, I think.

 

[Deleted member 24550]

It's an attractive idea that if there's a change in a company and subsequent success, that it's the new blood that precipitated that change. But I don't think it particularly holds up to scrutiny.

1. Nintendo is not some Bay area startup where a new management means that suddenly the working day is flipped and the designers are now brainstorming while being suspended from the ceiling. Nintendo is an over a hundred years old Japanese company. Kimishima is not new blood; Miyamoto and Takeda are still in charge. The culture will by and large have remained the same.
2. Iwata was so called new blood and gave Nintendo its biggest ever console success, followed by its biggest ever console dud. Openness to change is not a guarantee for success.
3. In general it ignores that Nintendo has always (or since the seventies at least) been a company that designs revolutionary concepts. Miyamoto and Yokoi championed prototyping and iterative design cycles, coming from an industrial design background. Switch is certainly no more out there than Wii. It's currently also not as successful, so any remark that the shift = more success is still unproven.
4. Since Iwata, Nintendo designs with a strong vision on society. The Wii tried to tackle our sedentary lifestyle by sports gaming and succeeded. The Wii U tried to tackle our insular lifestyle by creating incentives to play together in the living room, and failed. The Switch just took that concept and thought, if you can't get a group of people into your home to play together, let's create a way to bring the console to a group of people, and now seems to succeed. It's not so much radical reinvention by opening up to the wishes of westerners, as tuning the previous concept by iteration.
5. Zelda BotW harkened back to Zelda 1 which was made by Miyamoto. Odyssey is not necessarily more creative than Super Mario Galaxy. In fact the former feels more like a greatest hit album than the latter's inventive change of gravity and kishotenketsu approach to level design.
6. I think the only successful game that shows opening up is Splatoon. A multiplayer shooter is something Nintendo hasn't done since Perfect Dark and feels like a nod to the western market. But it's such a unique 'Nintendo' take on the genre that it can hardly be called listening to anyone.

 

[Raijinto]

I am really excited to get a Switch, but how is Super Mario Odyssey an evolution akin to BOTW? It's a 3D Mario game with a gimmick, just like Sunshine.

Click to shrink...

Well it's a complete game in every sense of the word unlike Sunshine which was evidently rushed to shelves incomplete, so that is already one massive disparity right there.

Can't really comment on which one is the most fun to play since I haven't played Sunshine in a long time but Odyssey at least is very, very fun.

 

[NinjaCoachZ]

Odyssey's gameplay formula is nothing new and it's definitely nowhere near BOTW as far as how intensely it rethinks the series of the conventions. Holistically though, the game is the sum of its parts, and there's a lot of creativity within those parts that add up to make it feel fresh.

 

[Deleted member 135]

Well it's a complete game in every sense of the word unlike Sunshine which was evidently rushed to shelves incomplete, so that is already one massive disparity right there.

Can't really comment on which one is the most fun to play since I haven't played Sunshine in a long time but Odyssey at least is very, very fun.

Click to shrink...

How is Sunshine incomplete?

 

[Zedark]

The Wii was a fundamental change as well. Except that one backfired when they announced a direct successor.

Click to shrink...

You mean a new controller.

 

[ned_ballad]

Odyssey's gameplay formula is nothing new and it's definitely nowhere near BOTW as far as how intensely it rethinks the series of the conventions. Holistically though, the game is the sum of its parts, and there's a lot of creativity within those parts that add up to make it feel fresh.

Click to shrink...

Odyssey's design honestly takes more cues from Banjo-Kazooie than it does 64/Sunshine. It's a collectathon with transformations and large worlds, with lots of personality and detail in them.

It's different than past Mario games. It doesn't quite feel like Mario 64 and certainly not Sunshine (outside of Island Delfino, the game is basically a giant game full of Delfinos). It almost feels like a game designed to be what people remember Mario 64 being like, but wasn't really what Mario 64 was like. There certainly aren't any huge worlds full of exploration in Mario 64.

 

[Gartooth]

Odyssey didn't really "break" the formula like BotW did, but the Mario series always reinvents itself so it didn't feel like it needed to. Plus I think Nintendo still deserves major props for doing something as ambitious as Odyssey and breaking away from the linear gameplay they had been refining since Galaxy.

For Nintendo as a whole I do want to see this kind of mentality go towards all of their IP. Granted I'm skeptical it would happen since the Mario and Zelda series are Nintendo royalty and not every IP will get that kind of treatment. I'm just thinking though about the IP that could really surprise us with a reinvention (Metroid, DK) and those that absolutely need it now. (Animal Crossing, Star Fox)

Also I think people should adjust their expectations on the second party devs like HAL and GameFreak. I think they are going to ride the Kirby/Pokemon formula to the end of time sadly.

 

[NinjaCoachZ]

Odyssey's design honestly takes more cues from Banjo-Kazooie than it does 64/Sunshine. It's a collectathon with transformations and large worlds, with lots of personality and detail in them.

It's different than past Mario games. It doesn't quite feel like Mario 64 and certainly not Sunshine (outside of Island Delfino, the game is basically a giant game full of Delfinos). It almost feels like a game designed to be what people remember Mario 64 being like, but wasn't really what Mario 64 was like. There certainly aren't any huge worlds full of exploration in Mario 64.

Click to shrink...

Now that you mention it that's actually a really good point. I think this really puts the finger on how I was feeling about it. 64 had fewer stars per level but more "in-depth" objectives while Odyssey basically has the "plot" stars and then the "exploration" stars. That really is a lot closer to Banjo or DK64 when you put it that way. Huh.

 

[Deleted member 7462]

What I noticed about both SMO and Mario + Rabbids is that they glory in the past games that made Mario iconic. I know that M+R is Ubi with Nintendo oversight, but the young man who was heading up the team for that game was clearly a Miyamoto fan based on his reaction to being called out by Miyamoto at E3.

We're at the point where the people making these games grew up playing them and are offering a blend of new perspectives on the gameplay and tribute to the older games in the series that is fun, exciting, and touches off nostalgia. That, to me, is what drives some of these extremely good Switch games.

 

[Gartooth]

Now that you mention it that's actually a really good point. I think this really puts the finger on how I was feeling about it. 64 had fewer stars per level but more "in-depth" objectives while Odyssey basically has the "plot" stars and then the "exploration" stars. That really is a lot closer to Banjo or DK64 when you put it that way. Huh.

Click to shrink...

Yeah that's exactly how I felt about Odyssey. It's like the marriage of 64's movement and platforming controls with the exploration of Banjo-Kazooie, and some of Galaxy's surprises and playfulness thrown in.

Props to the team for moving Mario towards that style of game so seamlessly. Abandoning a lives system, turning coins into currency, and getting rid of traditional powerups are all pretty big changes that helped benefit the game.

 

[Deleted member 202]

Thread reminded me of this video:

 

[The Unsent]

I'll see how Xenoblade 2 does before calling it a renaissance :) XCX was unfocused and boring, it needs to be good like the original and make up for that disappointment a couple of years ago.

 

[Undeniablybiased]

I imagine it started with the Wii's failure to sustain its audience, and the Wii U's failure in general. Seems to have led to the restructuring of the company and the build up of the younger generation of developers. So they become more efficient as a company, branch out into mobile in order to reinvigorate audiences with Nintendo IP, then go wild with their major franchises to excite old time fans and new fans alike.

 

[Lewpy]

I find the weird inflated adoration for Nintendo since the release of new hardware to be a little odd. The Wii U didn't have the same love as the Switch, even though the quality of the software output was pretty much the same. In fact a lot of the success of the Switch is directly the result of the death of the Wii U, so much that it's success stories are either ports or scavenged titles from the remains of the under appreciated console.

I guess my point is that this 'renaissance', if you can call it that is only observed from people who weren't invested in Nintendo's offerings. From my perspective, it's business as usual.

 

[Deleted member 9971]

Nintenaissance?

It really is an exciting time for Nintendo. I'm still not entirely convinced that the Switch will be something that changes the whole industry, but the games they're putting out are exciting in a way Nintendo's games haven't been for ages. Kind of unbelievable that we got such earth-shattering Zelda and Mario games within a year of each other.

Click to shrink...

I really hope devs get inspired by Zelda BotW and Mario Odyssey like in the past with other Mario and Zelda games. Both do some things so well that i want to see that influence in other games or new IP's too.

I really hope gamefreak does something with Pokemon that will blow us away on Switch but i really doubt they will sadly. A true Pokemon Console game with all new features and a open or way less linear world/region to explore would be so amazing for example and heck maybe even coop local/online multiplayer where you can explore together with a couple of friends like in the Anime/Cartoon.

Honestly anyway i hope this succes makes other devs/pubs less scared to innovate/revolutionize their core franchises and new IP's.

 

[Deleted member 12833]

Biggest difference I see is they didn't name their console something confusing

 

[Alexem]

There's an observation that GameCentral/metro.co.uk have made from time to time and I'm inclined to agree with it - Nintendo always seem to be at their best when they have their back against the wall. The Gamecube didn't sell so well, but they went on to have more success with the DS and Wii. The Wii U struggled, but the Switch has made much more of a positive start. I don't know if it's anything to do with corporate complacency following successes or if it's just a matter of coincidence, but it certainly appears to be a trend for them, at least the way that I see it.

 

[Undeniablybiased]

I find the weird inflated adoration for Nintendo since the release of new hardware to be a little odd. The Wii U didn't have the same love as the Switch, even though the quality of the software output was pretty much the same. In fact a lot of the success of the Switch is directly the result of the death of the Wii U, so much that it's success stories are either ports or scavenged titles from the remains of the under appreciated console.

I guess my point is that this 'renaissance', if you can call it that is only observed from people who weren't invested in Nintendo's offerings. From my perspective, it's business as usual.

Click to shrink...

I think a lot of people would disagree with that.