Sheikah

For me, I'm mostly interested in just MK and very much X. Hyrule Warriors I might look into, but its likely use of the DW template has set my level of excitement pretty low. So even if they did that, I'd mostly just want 2 of the games...

Oh I remember in Dark Souls 1, before they patched it, the Ring of Fog gave you the ability to be untargetable as well as be hard to see like that. The thing was damn FUCKED. Made PvP more than a little ridiculous, really. I must confess, I used it a few times in duels while in the dragon covenant before the final boss for the lulz. I got a few PSN messages from the fallen afterwards with some rather flavourful language. Needless to say, they nerfed that pretty quick.

The problem is that the Wii U has a terrible lack of third party support, so the first party releases seem too far between. In actuality, they're probably not being released much slower than they normally are.

I'm not contesting that given time, a franchise will become part of the Nintendo identity (hell, DK got invited into the 'Mario family' and was well known to be involved with Mario from the arcade days). All I'm saying is that at the point at which Xenoblade arrived, given not much had likely changed since acquisition, it didn't feel like Nintendo actually had anything to do with it other than funding. Which there's totally nothing wrong with. I was just saying that Nintendo themselves only really had a hand in actually making one of the games I really liked on the Wii, whereas they did more in the past. This wasn't supposed to be a full blown argument over what constitutes a first party game, just an observation. Maybe developer acquisition is the way forward for them given other console manufacturers do this so successfully.

I don't believe I said Sony brought them, not that it really matters. I feel this has been blown out of proportion now.

They may have contributed something, and Nintendo SPD is credited to them on their Wiki page, but I'm finding any information on it difficult to come by. What I do know is that the director was there before acquisition, and it was his idea, and the staff roster is formed mostly of the previous Squaresoft employees. You seem to have contracted Zechs's 'making stuff up' disease. When did I say that Sony made those games?

But a lot of those series have been developed on by Nintendo at some point, and often it's a case of Nintendo telling the studio "We want another game in this series, here is what we'd (roughly) like". That's not true with Xenoblade. It was Monolith's entire thing and they brought it to the table. I don't doubt Monolith will become an integral cog in the Nintendo machine. Just at the stage at which they came in, with the Xeno series already to their name, I have a hard time crediting Nintendo with much of the development of that particular game. Like I said, it wasn't a big point I was making, just that out of the only 2 games that majorly impressed me on the Wii, only one of them had any real development credit going to Nintendo.

Like the previous 2 games...I shall smelt platinum ingots and pour them over my saves.

Why not? Don't play yourself down dude. Maybe she likes you for your personality?

You're kidding, right? So if a woman who was incredibly out of your league in terms of hotness turned up in casual clothes, you'd be like 'see ya!' Who are you, Gok Wan?

The Xeno series and its development team existed long before Nintendo even sniffed in the direction of Monolith; Xenoblade is the product of the brilliant Tetsuya Takahashi (yeah, I realise it's set in a new world, but it's still his baby). That's why I have a tough time believing we can really credit its development or conception to Nintendo in any meaningful way, other than the brilliant moneyhat-ing they did. Which was, indeed, a brilliant moneyhat.

No one is saying they should stop making the games they do, they are saying they should make more Western style games on top of that / buy more Western studios. That way everyone wins. Also, saying that difference must be good is misleading. Difference in terms of variety, especially when franchise fatigue has been actively occurring for a while now, should be positively embraced.

It's all about variety at the end of the day. If the console has mostly Japanese games then certain audiences and developers will be put off. I can't see how there can be an argument that having mostly Japanese games is a good thing. Mix it up to expand your audience.

I have in my bag...Dark Souls 2. Something came up which meant I wouldn't have been able to play it over the weekend anyway. Tonight...yes.

I'm just not sure how it could be proven, in terms of them getting their money back, other than there being some sort of check that the digital game had never been launched (and I don't even know if that's possible to check).

Yeah same, somehow got a silver discount and ordered it before when it was cheaper (no idea how I got silver, I'm sure the purchase requirements used to be higher).

I'm finding the pacing in this series a bit slow. Really hoping it picks up soon.

What, you mean Metroid and DK games, which are already Nintendo property? :p To me, it feels like Nintendo were quite heavily there from the off! From what I can find out, Monolith did nearly all of it, and I wasn't making a huge point anyway. Just that whatever Nintendo themselves were doing in the past, they're mostly doing sequels now.

I know that they bought them. But Nintendo themselves didn't make it. Which was the point I was getting at - Nintendo themselves made some awesome new IP back in the day, but now seem to be more of a sequel maker. I know they do, but it was an already formed studio prior to its acquisition. To me, it's the same as saying that Pixar films are actually Disney films because Disney acquired them. If they replaced staff with existing Nintendo employees (which in time, I guess does happen), and showed them how to make games to a 'Nintendo feel' then I could totally get behind that. To me though, it feels like a company doing what they do already but under Nintendo's banner.

Eh, I'd say that his criteria artificially padded the latter list while probably doing nothing at all for the earlier list. Who has ignored it? Who has worn the My Little Pony T-shirt? It's as if you're inventing people in order to have an argument. Xenoblade is without doubt a fine game, easily one of the best of the last generation. But it was one game; they needed more of that calibre, really. Last Story and Pandora's Tower were probably their best runner up IP, but they weren't even close to awesome. Xenoblade and Mario Galaxy are the two 'new and awesome' games of the Wii for me, which is really not enough when I look at past/other consoles. And of those, technically only one was actually made by Nintendo. The majority of Monolith's staff actually derive from Squaresoft.

Had mine on preorder for a while. ShopTo seem to have raised the price since I ordered as well.

I don't think the N64 library was that small at all; Serebii's list focuses on a very niche set of rules (Nintendo not even making the games or even doing much at all counting for the most recent list). I also meant in my post 'any IP' (not just Nintendo). Finally, I think it's not just numbers but also quality. Pokemon, Zelda OoT (I am counting this on account of how much new it did), Smash and Banjo Kazooie. Hell yeah. You can't deny how amazing they were back then given how quite a few of these games form the basis of the many conserved sequels which have now come our way. Also while not every game will be a blockbuster, often the ones that have considerable talent/funds behind them have a chance of being truly special. Xenoblade and Mario Galaxy didn't happen by chance, they had such incredible backing. What I meant was, I'd like to see more of that might thrown at new characters/games (like Xenoblade), even by Nintendo themself. And by that, yeah, I mean not Pullblox. People do indeed pay more attention to sequels but that's understandable, really. They know it's a sequel to a game they enjoyed, whereas an unknown game may not be amazing (realistically, most games aren't). But developers play to this in order for a safe income. Ultimately they've got go risk it for a biscuit. Carry on channelling most of your funds and talent into sequels for safe profit, or try make some amazing new games that may fail or may breathe much needed life into the brand.

I think they chuck all their money and people at their sequels though. If you look at most of their new IP, most of it ain't Xenoblades. Pullblox? Ca'maan. Let's see a new character with a new kind of awesome game.

Well if he has, that'd explain things.

I've also been getting tickets for random things too recently (like Elder Scrolls Beta invites) so seems like it could just be a new thing.