Tendo City

From PGC:

Quote:It’s time to let Nintendo of America do what it needs to do to win back market share.

Written: 01/13/2005

When Minoru Arakawa and a few associates founded Nintendo of America in the early 1980s, it was envisioned as a distribution channel for the parent company’s arcade games. Two decades later, Nintendo Co. Ltd. in Japan still treats NOA like a distribution channel. It was smart business for a while; after all, hard-nosed Japanese business tactics helped Nintendo become the top gaming company on both sides of the Atlantic in the late eighties and early nineties. However, as Sony and eventually Microsoft moved into the market by wooing developers and pushing their games towards new audiences, Nintendo saw its business in America shrink, even as the gaming industry grew rapidly.

Since the end of the N64 era, Nintendo has promised to ease its business tactics, win back third-party support, and appeal towards all ages of gamers. These methods have resulted in limited success; the Nintendo of today is in some ways different and much improved from its cocky personage during the N64 years, but in other ways, little has changed.

One key factor that has not changed much at all is NCL’s near-absolute control over its American subsidiary. Anyone who deals with NOA quickly learns that the company’s bureaucracy extends all the way from Redmond to Kyoto. They can’t say this because NCL doesn’t like it; they can’t do that because NCL won’t approve it. I personally know a lot of smart, ambitious people at NOA who could probably make the company much more successful than it currently is, but their hands are tied by the executives in Japan.

Have you ever wondered why Nintendo Power doesn’t include demo discs for subscribers? The people at the magazine would love to do it, but NCL won’t let them. Would you believe that all third-party games must be tested at both NOA and NCL, even for a U.S.-only release? This drawn-out process may be part of the reason that the GameCube version of multiplatform games is usually last to be developed and last to be released. Wonder why Nintendo’s games seem to get less preview coverage in the press? NCL offers fewer and more limited chances for us to play the games, and requests for developer interviews (especially for anyone in Japan) are usually shut down. That goes for media of all sizes and audiences, not just us independent enthusiast websites.

There’s no denying that NCL is a venerable company with a great deal of experience to work upon. They also happen to be the source for some of the best video games in the world and of all time. But their failure to distinguish the decline of the Japanese game industry from the booming American game industry has left NOA in a terrible position. NCL President Satoru Iwata accentuates this failure with every published interview.

"It is true that the 3D video game gave a boost to our industry but at the same time, people were beginning to drift away from playing games due to the complexity," Nintendo president Satoru Iwata told reporters.

"In other words, the old formula for success -- the combination of high-specification game consoles and advanced graphics -- is no longer working." Source: GameSpot 12/9/2004

Of course, that “old formula” is still extremely successful in North America, and far from seeing 3D games scare away new consumers, we have seen the market literally explode in the past few years, as games become less abstract and easier for new users to become immersed in. It’s clear that Nintendo needs a new direction in the American market…but it’s not clear that the right direction is to move as far away as possible from what is already bringing success to the company’s competitors.

Some Nintendo fans fear the Americanization of the gaming industry. They see American games as generic, American gamers as having poor taste, and American publishers as being unstoppable juggernauts seeking to condense a talented development pool into one giant sweat shop, pumping out one roster-updated sports game after another. These fears are exaggerated but not unfounded. They are, however, not related to the issue of NOA’s need for independence. I am not suggesting that NOA should keep any Japan-developed games out of the American market. Nintendo is not in the business of designing dating simulations or elaborate text adventure games, but if they were, I’m sure even those games could be successful in America. It just takes a serious marketing effort by people who understand the American market. There are such people already working at NOA, but they are not being given the freedom to carry out the steps needed to make Nintendo systems and games attractive to American gamers.

There is at least one beacon of hope for NOA, a sign that things are changing: Reggie Fils-Aime, Executive Vice President, Sales and Marketing. This has nothing to do with his fiery speech to the media at E3 2004. Over the past several months, I have heard encouraging talk that Reggie is being given unprecedented freedom by NCL to steer NOA towards a new public image. He seems to have been influential in arranging for the Nintendo DS to be launched in America before Japan. When he requested additional hardware allocation for America, promising that every single unit could be sold, NCL complied despite facing direct competition from Sony’s PSP launch in Japan. If NOA is to make Nintendo successful in America once more, this kind of trust from NCL needs to be given more freely and more often.

Nintendo’s business practices have left us all scratching our heads at one time or another. Maybe it’s because NCL is enforcing a business model designed for Japan upon its American subsidiary. When representatives at NOA give us strange explanations for why they have quickly fallen to third-place in the console race, maybe it’s because they are reluctant to acknowledge the limitations on their ability to make decisions for this region. When we see Nintendo designing its entire plan for the future around a flailing Japanese market, even though the American market has been larger for years and is still expanding, maybe it’s time for NCL to allow, or NOA to fight for, a little independence.


Jonathan Metts, Director

Now that's what I call a Revolution.

If anything I think Japan should be STRICTER on NOA! NOA makes some very boneheaded moves, like saying "Oh... never mind, let's NOT release Mother 1 in the US..." or "Let's force the US translations of AWESOME games to SUCK.". Granted, they seem to be shaping up, but then they do stuff like NOT release certain games and I hate them all over again. I think it's best if the people currently running NOA don't get any more power.

Let's not forget that they actually TOOK OUT AN ENTIRE GAME from Four Swords Adventures, and the growing review I seem to be reading is that, contrary to what NOA claims is the reason they scrapped it, it was actually very fun! Also, they totally changed Donkey Konga with the idea that "it should be tailored to American audiences". I want purity of essence and form in my translations :D, give us what they actually sent, and don't be stubborn about it and decide to only translate voice actors but not the text or something (This means YOU recent anime translators... I can't read that!).

But seriously, I think as far as advertising NOA has actually been given free reign recently, and considering that's pretty much all they are good for aside from translating that's really all they need, right?

I wouldn't blame the non-release of Earthbound, etc, just on NOA... if NCL wanted them released here they would be. I am sure that NOA was not acting alone in any of the cases you cited and that, indeed, NCL in some of them was probably telling them to do that...

Oh yeah, and to refute the idea that NOA doesn't need any more freedom, see the part about demo disks in Nintendo Power.

Did you read the article at all, DJ? NOA cannot make ANY decisions, only NCL can. They tell NOA what to do and NOA simply handels their foriegn relations. NCL watches over every translation, even if the game is to be released in the states only. NCL is why we dont have Earthbound yet, NOA has all the power of the queen of england or in other words, about as much say-so as the pointy end of nothing sharpened.

NCL designs the American and European commercials. NCL decides what game is to be released in what region and which region gets which version and which version will be the one people will want most. NOA has no control over anything. And that's what makes the most sense in this circus; the Japanese market is failing because Japanese people are getting bored with video games (across all home consoles) but are going nuts over GBA, DS and even PSP.

Nintendo has made countless claims stating: "It's time we move away from the TV and in to NEW AND INCREDIBLE WAYS OF PLAYING YOU NEVER THOUGHT OF!" which had nothing to do with gameplay, but actual new methods of how you play a video game in general, such as an E-Reader for your GBA or connectivity to your Gamecube or dual touch screens and WI FI! Shit, NCL isn't even pushing the GC anymore.

Those choices are not meant to entice American gamers (and it shows), it's for the Japanese gamers because Nintendo is a Japanese company that caters to the Japanese FIRST. The DS is the first anything to be released outside of Japan from Nintendo before the Japanese get it, and that decision was pushed by NOA to combat the PSP, otherwise NCL would have released it after the PSP launch so they can take their "wait and see" approach as they've done countless times.

Which works in Japan since Japanese have no problem with spending gobs of cash on something and then taking it back to the store after owning it a few weeks. It happened with the N64 in Japan and to a lesser extent it happened with the Dreamcast and Gamecube. But that kinda shit never happens here, if we dont like it we sell it for half the price and get some used game for an older system because American stores wont take it back after a few days (some wont take it back if you opened it). But Nintendo cant understand that type of business because it's a Japanese company. They dont understand what America wants from Nintendo. Which is what weltall said in a previous thread: "I dont want new amazing krap, I just want good games."

The sooner NOA has their own say-so, the sooner we can have kick ass ads and a better marketing strategy. One that can compete with Sony and Microsoft. If NOA was in charge, we would have had a sequel to Super Metroid alot frikin sooner than a damn decade later. NOA got countless letters asking for a new Metroid since the release of Super Metroid and couldn't do anything about it because NCL has reports showing that Super Metroid sold poorly in Japan. So since Japan didn't like Metroid, no one gets Metroid.

It wasn't until NOA begged to have Samus in SSB for N64 and let NCL see the reaction to it, then they said we'll think about it. Then NCL partnered itself with Retro Studios and told them to make it, an American company, a game for Americans. But every second of cut-scenes, every model and every character of text had to meet NCL's approval, and half the time (or more) NCL was designing the cut-scenes, models and dialogue because it's supposed to be a Nintendo game, but their weird japanese business practices say that because they failed in grabbing a Japanese audience with previous efforts, they shouldn't put any more effort in to it.

Metroid Prime was the first game from Nintendo that was made with Americans in mind.

The only input that NOA got to put in to Metroid Prime was the ad campaign that was directed by the guy that did The Crow and make sure the ad campaign really spoke to Metroid fans. It was mostly NOA who headed that marketing campaign with NCL's money and guess what? It's the best marketing campaign Nintendo ever did.

I'm glad NCL had to approve every part of Prime. Who knows what it would be like otherwise? Besides, NOA doesn't really have any game designers in it, what freedom exactly are they going to get? The freedom to tell NCL designers what to make? That's not going to happen.

What are you talking about? Retro is NOA. NST is NOA.

I for one really hope that NOA gets freedom from NCL because it's obvious that they cannot succeed here with ultra-conservative NCL deciding what's best for the American market. But it'll never happen.

Retro Studios is NOA? I thought it was a 2nd party, hence the seperate company title?

But if that's true, that NOA is responsible for half of Metroid Prime's content and all of it's coding and programing then good lord they've come along way from translating...

DJ, the freedom that the article is talking about and that i'm talking about is freedom in marketing decisions and content. Right now, NCL decides the marketing campaigns for America and Europe. Hiring outsourced crews but designing the storyboards and overall scope of the projects. Those desicions need to be made by NOA for America, and NCL for Japan.

I'd bet that NCL is the main reason why Silicon Knights left, too...

You know, that never made any sense to me. When i heard that SK is leaving, I thought it was a joke. I remember the articles websites were posting, like: "Silicon Knights announces at 3:33 PM that they are no longer an exclusive company to Nintendo." And I immeadiately thought it was a joke...

I guess it has to do with mutiple factors. Perhaps NCL was hoping that Eternal Darkness would generate more sales, and because Eternal Darkness didn't live up to expectation in Nintendo's pocketbook, so Nintendo let them go. That's very Japanese in business...

Rare I could understand because of all the people that were leaving. Even the super Stamper bros. were leaving, though i heard one of them came back to the company. But most of it's employees seperated in to Zoonami and Free Radical. I wish the best for Rare but i'll probably never own an XBox, I can only afford one current gen console. I heard Grabbed by the Ghoulies is a really good game but it bombed horribly. But then we have the Conker Remake, so hopefully Rare will find it's audience there.

On GBA B~K, Banjo Pilot and that side scroller (forgot the name) seemed to have done well in getting people's interest and seem to be well made games. I love DKR, hopefully BT captures the same fun of that game.

I think most of the reasoning behind the Rare/Nintendo split was that Rare takes it's time designing games to the point of being rediculous, but when they rushed a game for launch, Starfox Adventures, it sorely showed. And the announcement was made shortly after the GC launch, with rumors milling about months prior.

SK, though... makes no sense. They get hitched with Nintendo, collaborate on one game, which is one of the best GC games to date and a survival horror game that can stand among the Resident Evil's and Silent Hill's of the industry (sometimes even surpassing them in some ways, such as the voice acting, cut scenes and gameplay mechanics) and then suddenly, without warning they split and go there seperate ways. I never understood that.

lazyfatbum Wrote:Retro Studios is NOA? I thought it was a 2nd party, hence the seperate company title?

But if that's true, that NOA is responsible for half of Metroid Prime's content and all of it's coding and programing then good lord they've come along way from translating...

Retro is a first-party studio. Rare was a second-party studio. The difference is that Retro is wholly owned by Nintendo. All of Nintendo's first-party devs have separate company titles. I'm sure you've played Paper Mario 2 with the Intelligent Systems logo right after the Nintendo one, or HAL before SSB, etc.

As for the SK thing, it still makes no sense to me. IGN is going to have a big article about it in February, though, supposedly explaining the whole situation.

Ah yes, honestly I didn't really consider them NOA itself though, rather a 1st party that answers to NCL... But they are NIntendo, and they are in America... so yeah...

And as for advertising freedom, if that's all, then yes I totally agree that NOA should be the ones making all those decisions. Just, let's not let them make any decisions that change Japanese products for the American market... My NES works perfectly, but only because I make sure to tune it up every few months, and honestly from what I've read, NOA is to blame for the US design of that system.

Sigh... DJ, the whole point is that NOA needs a lot more than just some advertising freedom...

Dark Jaguar Wrote:My NES works perfectly, but only because I make sure to tune it up every few months, and honestly from what I've read, NOA is to blame for the US design of that system.

You're right about that, but you can't really blame them. Everyone thought home videogames were dead, and Nintendo wanted the NES to not bring back memories of Atari. Even if you don't like their decision on the system's design, you have to admit they made a gutsy decision to guarantee their systems when they sold them to retailers.

I still think that the US NES looks really great... the fact that that spring-load system breaks is too bad, but it looks cool. :)

Honestly I'm not sure how the spring loaded design was supposed to keep people from saying "Atari". I mean, the Atari never had cartridge loading problems. Mine works fine.

Uh, I believe Derek was referring to the design of the system. The colors, the wood, etc. It did look a bit like an Atari system.

Off-topic: Free Hats!!

Free <b>Hat</b>. If you were making the South Park reference.

"Get that man a baby!"

"Obviously he killed those babies in self-defense!"

NES looks like and Atari? Uh... if you say so... but I don't know if I would...

When I saw the title "Free NOA" I was hoping that Starmen.net took the place hostage until Nintendo finally released EB64, like those Mother-loving kids always talked about doing.

The NES really doesn't look like an Atari to me. The Famicom didn't really look like one either aside from sharing the top loading design.

<img src="http://www.atarihq.com/tsr/odd/fc/fami-3.jpg">

Though to be honest the Famicom DID look a lot more like a toy than the NES did. Maybe they redesigned it purely for that reason? Honestly the alternate color scheme and shape changing were never a problem to me so much as the spring loading.

Oh, speaking of spring loading, I sure hope the spring loading mechanism on the DS is designed to last as long as any other component on that system. It seems sturdy enough anyway. More than that, unlike the NES, I think the pin contacts are MUCH tighter on the DS than on the NES, and pin contact was the main problem anyway (not so much spring wear and tear, at least on mine).

I know I've said it before, but on looks I still like the original American NES best of the various NES models... yes, the spring thing is too bad, but it is cool looking. :)

After I read that, it wasn't too surprising about finding that out. It's always been the case, and I'm sure the competition lets their American divisions (and in Microsoft's case, just "common sense"), letting the market itself dictate what they want.

NOA needs a lot more than just marketing freedom. They need to be able to develop independent games for themselves, publish them, pursue third parties here in the U.S. and of course, let the other branches of Nintendo do the same thing (remember Europe just used to be ARM, a distributor of Nintendo products before they became NOE?). In other words, they need to become an independent company, free to make its own decisions and get stuff approved. Will it happen? Dunno.

The redesigned, top-loading NES is pretty cool.

Will it happen? Given that this is Nintendo (and NCL is specific), likely not. They hate change and like having control just as much... and don't seem to care much about what anyone, the rest of the world included, thinks of it. On the one hand it gets us great games, but on the other hand... well, this post's pretty clear about the other hand.

Well the only way NOA will be able to make it's own games is if they get killer game making talent. Oh wait, they do that all the time, but they form seperat entities from NOA like NSC or Retro... When companies just make their overseas division start doing stuff aside from translating, Mystic Quest happens (and to a lesser extent, Secret of Evermore, but that was actually a pretty fun game, just not as good as the Seiken Densetsu series).

Are you living in the early 90's?

No, I think DJ is just living in fantasy-land... if NST and Retro don't count what studio would?

NST and Retro are wholly-owned subsidiaries of Nintendo, not some second-parties who Nintendo has a contract with. NOA should have some power over what kind of games that they make, though I don't think they should have free reign.

Okay then, I see what you are saying.

However, again NOA having control over these other companies would be bad (I never said they weren't a part of Nintendo really, just that I consider them not part of NOA). NOA has no game designers in it. Shigeru Miyamoto having creative control is fine, but I'd rather not see ad executives have any control at all over what games they make.

On the other hand, letting Retro make it's OWN decisions on what games to make, THAT wouldn't be a bad idea at all. They learned a lot in making Prime, though honestly I really don't think Prime would have been nearly as good without Miyamoto ordering them around. Anyway, give Retro, for example, free reign over itself. NOA can have free reign over advertising, but I do not think NOA should be telling Retro what games to make, not until NOA itself because a software developing part of Nintendo that's proven itself anyway.

Oh, as to why I seperate NOA from Retro and the other American Nintendo developers? Well, I do because Nintendo seems to. They don't call the Retro development house "Retro of NOA", just "Retro" of Nintendo.

DJ... you can't understand at all how the idea that Nintendo is probably never going to succeed greatly in America again if they continue to apply Japanese business practices and ideas to America where a lot of those things just don't apply? Yes, Nintendo makes great games. But don't let that blind you to the obvious problems that centralizing all control in Japan brings!

Look look, read my post again, because I think you misunderstand me. The idea of Retro themselves making important decisions about what games they make is a good one, I'm for that. However, the idea of NOA making those decisions is something I'm not for. It's not about having American branches making business decisions on their own, that's not a bad idea, it's about WHICH American branches get to make those decisions.