Under the painstaking efforts of Nintendo for decades, one by one national IP that is now familiar is gradually established in the hearts of players. Mario, Zelda and other series have become evergreen trees in the whole history of video games. For many Nintendo players, "not playing non-IP games" seems to be a psychological stereotype. But at the same time, such a psychological set can sometimes become a thorny issue.
Recently, Xiao Ye Kenshi, a veteran player in the Japanese game industry, published a review article "Review of Xiao Ye's Game History". The article lists that there are only two original IP works of Nintendo's own millions of sales masterpieces in 2020, namely "The Adventure of Fitness Ring" and "The Chain of Alien World", and the number of original works is scarce, and criticizes that the rest of Nintendo's works are all relying on the old money.
On the other hand, as much as 82.8% of Nintendo Switch's game sales revenue is Nintendo's own IP. The consequence of this situation is that it is difficult for other manufacturers to get involved. The console platform of Switch is more like a "stage" for Nintendo to entertain itself than an open console game store.
In fact, criticisms like Xiao Ye's constitutional history have a long history, but the "28 Law" is reversed in everything. "Nintendo 8, Other 2" seems to set off the power of Nintendo too much, making the Switch open game ecology ineffective.
So, why is this happening? GameLook wants to ask: Why can Nintendo support Switch to be unbeaten by its own game? Today we will discuss one or two.
Nintendo, a powerful first-party game, propped up Switch alone.
According to the console game sales data displayed on VGChartz, the top ten games in the Switch platform sales list are all occupied by Nintendo. What's even more outrageous is that Nintendo's "Slaughter List" lasted until it was ranked 19, and was ended by Ubisoft's Mario+raving rabbids: The Battle of the Kingdom.
Ironically, even if a challenger like Ubisoft appears on the list, its Mario+Crazy Rabbit still borrows Nintendo's IP, which shows Nintendo's reign of terror on its own platform. Of the top 50 games sold by VGchartz on the Switch platform, 32 are from Nintendo, accounting for 64%.
In contrast, Sony's PS4 platform sales list is "harmonious".
On the PS4 platform, the top 10 games are provided by five different game manufacturers. Sony Interactive Entertainment, which represents the first party, has only four games in TOP 10, and its future ranking also shows the trend of "you chase after me". On the whole, the best-selling list of PS4 gives people a feeling of "letting a hundred flowers blossom", which reflects the balanced development of PS4 game platform ecology.
The completely different performances of Switch and PS4 bestsellers make criticism and praise stick to their own words.
Some critics think that the Switch platform is too rigid, Nintendo is the leader and does not conform to the "diversified market", while the PS4 is the "normal" host market. From the developer's point of view, this statement makes sense. But when the judgment standard turns to the player, can this statement be established? GameLook doesn't think so.
From the player's point of view, choosing a game has its subjective factors, such as IP, personal game experience, game preferences and habits, but from the perspective of the host platform, it is more to meet the needs of players for different types of games.
Compared with Microsoft and Sony as the first party to acquire studios, Nintendo has always attached great importance to the independent development of games. The richness of Nintendo's first-party self-developed game categories is unparalleled in the host "Feather Three".
Strong self-research ability enables Nintendo to adopt the strategy of "casting a wide net" for different player groups.
In Nintendo camp, RPG types include the legend of zelda, Racing Mario Kart, Adventure Mario Odyssey, Simulation Business includes shooting games such as Animal Forest, Collection and Development Kit, Jet Fighter, fighting games such as Nintendo Star Wars, sandbox games such as Super Mario, etc ... The mainstream game types and players in the market.
In addition, Nintendo also has a series of casual games such as "World Game Encyclopedia", which brings together more than N kinds of classic chess, board games and poker. The category layout of Nintendo's own first-party games is really exaggerated.
Hosts and games are like fish and water. The host is the platform on which the game depends, and the game is the key to keep the game machine alive. Nintendo's expansion with the help of classic IP types is the best embodiment of this sentence. In Nintendo's thinking, this can not only expand the value of IP itself, show its plasticity, but also avoid the loss of players on the Switch platform due to the lack of a certain type of head products.
Maybe NS players don't like some Nintendo games very much, but Nintendo's attitude is to ensure that there will be a Nintendo game for players to buy in this category. This approach is that Nintendo will give its own platform an insurance. This kind of thinking and strategy is an important reason why Nintendo supports the Switch platform alone.
"Three grave machines" situation, whose pot?
"Three grave machines" refers to the graves of third-party game manufacturers. The title of "Three Graves Machine", as a stalk for players to tease each other, is more a symbolic overview of the long-term past performance of NS platform. Because many facts have been repeatedly verified, as long as third-party game manufacturers sell games on Nintendo consoles such as WII and NDS, the sales of this game will be very bleak.
Of course, this sentence can't be so absolute. For example, SE's Traveler from All Sides and Single Tour Empty Knight have also achieved good results on the Switch, but such games are really rare.
The phenomenon of "three grave machines" naturally has its complicated factors. Let's refocus our attention on the Nintendo tree itself and see what the reason is.
As we all know, among the three host manufacturers, Nintendo's NS is the only portable host device, which is very popular among players. However, when God opens a window for you, he will also close a door for you. The hardware performance of NS is also the weakest among the three major manufacturers.
As a result, many 3A games that can run smoothly on PS4 and XBOX need a series of complicated optimizations after being transplanted to ns, and sometimes even after being optimized, they can't run on NS.
Most game developers are unwilling to do such thankless things, especially those 3A game manufacturers who win by pictures. Therefore, NS will naturally exclude some high-quality 3D games from other platforms in terms of device performance. At the same time, it is basically declared that many masterpieces are "insulated" from NS.
Some small and medium-sized developers have seen the living space from the dilemma of Nintendo platform, and NS platform, which lacks masterpieces, has become a gathering place for many stand-alone developers. However, this has also caused a problem: a large number of 2D games and indie games with average quality have flocked to Nintendo Switch eShop.
Nintendo has a development attitude towards these games. For example, every year, some independent games that log on to the Switch host will be featured. After all, the addition of many games not only expands the platform, but also gives players more additional choices.
However, the loose content on the shelves also made Nintendo bear the nickname of "4399 host market". Games with different quality are flooding the EShop store, but it has to be said that the PS4 and Xbox are also the same, but Nintendo is more obvious.
In contrast to the disparity in quality, Nintendo's self-developed games are obviously more attractive to players than those of small and medium-sized manufacturers, which is another important reason for Nintendo's "killing list".
The game is not good enough, and the boutique strategy wins.
Last month, GameLook reported the 2020 revenue report released by Nintendo.
This proud "report card" shows that by the end of March 2020, the cumulative sales volume of mainframes in Nintendo Switch reached 55.77 million units. In the past year, the sales volume of Switch game consoles was 210.03 million units, an increase of 24% over last year, of which the sales volume of Switch consoles was10.483 million units and the sales volume of Switch Lite was 610.9 million units. The annual software sales volume was 6.5438+68 million sets, an increase of 42.3% over last year.
It can be estimated from the above data that each Switch player buys about 3-4 games on Nintendo every year, which actually reflects the consumption habits of Switch players, and also reflects that host players are more cautious when buying games. This is understandable, because the high trial cost of host games determines that host players can't try many games like mobile gamers.
Nintendo knows well the sales routines of console games, so "winning with excellent products" has always been its main strategy.
In addition, the continuous high investment in marketing advertisements is another important reason why Nintendo's game sales can be maintained. The financial report shows that Nintendo spent 76 billion yen on marketing and advertising last year and 846,543.8 billion yen on research and development, an increase of 20.9% compared with last year.
This year is no exception. According to foreign media reports, from April 16 to May 15, 2020, although the advertising exposure of North American game industry decreased by 26.67% compared with last month, Nintendo still occupied the first position in advertising exposure. The monthly exposure of Nintendo's Mario Kart 8 advertisement in North America is 65.438+0.5 billion times, ranking first in exposure.
Compared with the advertisements of other console games, Nintendo's advertisements are mostly based on the classic IP series for decades, which is more likely to give players a psychological hint of "selling masterpieces", so it is naturally more attractive to players than those independent games as "new faces".
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The collapse of the third party in Switch has caused many developers not to understand Nintendo and NS platforms, and nicknames such as "Three Graves Machine" have followed. Contrary to this incomprehension, NS players love Nintendo deeply. But it is undeniable that both developers and players love Switch and respect Nintendo.
For third-party game manufacturers, many people simply blame the "three grave machines" on "original sins" such as "bad platform", which GameLook thinks is inappropriate. Developers only see that Nintendo's performance shortcomings bind their hands and feet, but ignore its many types of fine games, strategies that fit any player's consumption habits, and huge advertising and marketing investment, which are the keys for Nintendo to dominate the NS platform.
What should a game company do if it wants to become famous on the Swich platform? In fact, the route has always been very clear, and the game categories that Nintendo does not do have always been there.