Pikmin 3

[Serebii]

Of course, businesses make no mistakes. I forgot what a business man you are, constantly spouting the business line for Nintendo 'if they make money it's not a failure!' - as I asked in the other thread; does that include if they only make 10p profit on a whole venture? It's profit right, not a failure.

 

Basically, your argument is that because they're a business they're infallible and so it MUST be something that was beyond their own control that caused the delay - but you can't actually tell me what? So you're basically running a god argument here, you can't see him and have no proof, but he exists.

 

 

Give me an actual, unavoidable reason, that could have caused the delay. I've given lots of usual reasons, none of which are applicable in this case, because all the control rests with Nintendo themselves.

 

 

I'm not sure if you view yourself as impartial, but you're not exactly operating on anything here - seems like you carry quite a Nintendo bias.

No, I'm showing knowledge of the game industry. Nobody delays a game for no reason. This has nothing to do with bias. Hell, I'm not that interested in Pikmin so there's no reason for me to defend it.

 

A game breaking bug could have been found.

Assets could not have been able to be done in time

They wanted to fine tune everything to perfection

 

It could be one of any number of things

[Retro_Link]

My money would be on @Hero\-of\-Time's reason that Nintendo aren't finding HD game development particularly easy at the moment, and probably a reason why they're trying to create quite a few games in [X] Partnership with other developers as well as outsourcing franchises more and more.

 

They showed Pikmin at E3 with 5months until the Wii U launch... they expected to have the game done in those 5 months ready for a launch window release. There is NO WAY they could have underestimated the games development by a further 8 months!... 5 doesn't just turn into 13 unless you're struggling somewhere! Especially for a game that had been in development for who knows how long already.

 

Heck most developers could have built the entire game from scratch in 13months!

[are1981]

I am disappoint with you people.

 

 

 

Am I really the only one who noticed the flying Pikmin?

 

 

 

I actually thought everyone noticed.

 

Hyped!

[Fierce_LiNk]

Pretty sure the main reason for the delay is simply that Nintendo weren't happy with the game yet.

Yes it's very annoying that it's taking such a long time for Pikmin 3 to come out, but I'd still much rather they delay it to release a high quality and polished game, rather than release it in a bad way just for the sake of getting a game out there.

 

Pretty much this.

 

We'd all be crying blue murder if the game got released and half of it was missing or unplayable. The game seems to have been in development forever, but so did Aliens: Colonial Marines, and even that could have benefited from a bit more time.

 

It's annoying that it isn't out yet, of course. I still would have preferred for it to be on the Wii, but from what has been said, the control schemes seem to be tight.

[madeinbeats]

It's probably a bit of both. Nintendo already officially stated they needed to retrain all their developers for HD and in the use of shaders. But the game mechanics have changed mid-development too have they not? The number of playable characters changed from 3 to 5 or the other way round didn't it? Something like that obviously has a massive knock on effect to the rest of the game.

[Jonnas]

What valid reasons, I've already said this - don't just say vague stuff; actually back it up. How do you KNOW it got valid reasons, any more than it wasn't just due to poor planning and execution on Nintendo's part? Most delays are due to things beyond the developers control, here; it's ALL Nintendo - full control. If there's not external factor, then it's them. You seem convinced it got delayed for valid reasons, but I can't see any.

 

Why do YOU act like there's definitely a sensible, justifiable, valid reason for the delay?

 

Asking for proof when you know there is none? Come on, Rummy...

 

As humans, we need to use our intuition. Even stupid delays like Rayman Legends had reasons, even if they weren't anything we'd find justifiable.

 

Nintendo has delayed games for a multitude of reasons, and for most of them, it's impossible to verify just how justifiable they were. Would Kid Icarus, Kirby's Return to Dream Land and Smash Bros Brawl be just as good before their delays, or would they be missing something crucial? Hard to know, because so many things could've been added or altered during that time.

 

Of one thing we can be certain of, is that Nintendo almost always delays games for the sake of actually finishing them, no marketing or other ulterior motives behind it. The only exception I can think of is Twilight Princess, but I seriously doubt that the reasons that got that one delayed also apply to Pikmin 3.

[Kav]

My thoughts... it got delayed as it was originally a Wii game. They then pulled a Twilight Princess and decided to release it on WiiU. They polished it and upgraded some textures here and there and thought it was ready to be a release game. They then got feedback after showing it and realised a lot of people were saying it looked like an upgraded Wii game and not like it was built from the ground up for WiiU.

They've not started again from scratch but they're doing as much polishing as they can to get it looking as good as they can... for an upgraded Wii game.

[Serebii]

My money would be on @Hero\-of\-Time's reason that Nintendo aren't finding HD game development particularly easy at the moment, and probably a reason why they're trying to create quite a few games in [X] Partnership with other developers as well as outsourcing franchises more and more.

 

They showed Pikmin at E3 with 5months until the Wii U launch... they expected to have the game done in those 5 months ready for a launch window release. There is NO WAY they could have underestimated the games development by a further 8 months!... 5 doesn't just turn into 13 unless you're struggling somewhere! Especially for a game that had been in development for who knows how long already.

 

Heck most developers could have built the entire game from scratch in 13months!

Most developers don't use their own engines...they just throw it on Unreal or Unity so it'd be hard for them to make a full on AAA title in one year. Hell, the yearly Assassin's Creed, CoD etc. aren't actually yearly in development but developed in tandem with the rest. AC4 started while Revelations was being finished, for example

Edited April 18, 2013 by Serebii

[Hero-of-Time]

Of one thing we can be certain of, is that Nintendo almost always delays games for the sake of actually finishing them, no marketing or other ulterior motives behind it. The only exception I can think of is Twilight Princess, but I seriously doubt that the reasons that got that one delayed also apply to Pikmin 3.

 

That Devilish Brain Training or whatever it's called was delayed for marketing reasons mere days before release. Dcubed was furious.

[Jonnas]

My thoughts... it got delayed as it was originally a Wii game. They then pulled a Twilight Princess and decided to release it on WiiU. They polished it and upgraded some textures here and there and thought it was ready to be a release game. They then got feedback after showing it and realised a lot of people were saying it looked like an upgraded Wii game and not like it was built from the ground up for WiiU.

They've not started again from scratch but they're doing as much polishing as they can to get it looking as good as they can... for an upgraded Wii game.

 

That's...quite the stretch. A lot of assumptions being made, there.

 

Twilight Princess was pretty much finished when they delayed it to fit on the Wii. To say that the same happened with Pikmin 3 is making quite the assumption. If you ask me, it changed to the Wii U mid-development, like Starfox Adventures.

 

That Devilish Brain Training or whatever it's called was delayed for marketing reasons mere days before release. Dcubed was furious.

 

I stand corrected, then

[Retro_Link]

Most developers don't use their own engines...they just throw it on Unreal or Unity so it'd be hard for them to make a full on AAA title in one year. Hell, the yearly Assassin's Creed, CoD etc. aren't actually yearly in development but developed in tandem with the rest. AC4 started while Revelations was being finished, for example

Yes but no offense, Pikmin 3 is hardly on the scale of an Assassins Creed game in terms size or what's being asked visually. Plus Nintendo have had two prior Pikmin games to build off, and already got their head around Wiimote controls with the updated Wii versions.

[Kav]

That's...quite the stretch. A lot of assumptions being made, there.

 

Twilight Princess was pretty much finished when they delayed it to fit on the Wii. To say that the same happened with Pikmin 3 is making quite the assumption. If you ask me, it changed to the Wii U mid-development, like Starfox Adventures

 

I actually do agree, I'm just ranting. I do think it was made to go WiiU mid-development but I do think they were fairly far along into development when they decided to switch it.

[Serebii]

Yes but no offense, Pikmin 3 is hardly on the scale of an Assassins Creed game in terms size or what's being asked visually. Plus Nintendo have had two prior Pikmin games to build off, and already got their head around Wiimote controls with the updated Wii versions.

Well that's because Pikmin are tiny...to do an area the size of Rome in it would take decades...

 

 

...I'll get my coat :p

 

I get what you mean, though but I do disagree about the visuals. I think this game looks gorgeous and I honestly don't see how people can say it's just an up-resolutioned Wii game

Edited April 18, 2013 by Serebii

[Retro_Link]

Well that's because Pikmin are tiny...to do an area the size of Rome in it would take decades...

 

 

...I'll get my coat :p

 

I get what you mean, though but I do disagree about the visuals. I think this game looks gorgeous and I honestly don't see how people can say it's just an up-resolutioned Wii game

I almost made the same joke! :p

 

It does look nice, but I meant more in terms of Assassins still looking nice whilst doing so many other things well on screen at the same time. Pikmin is largely a static environment.

 

Not to say I wouldn't rather play Pikmin though because I probably would.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Retro_Link

[Rummy]

No, I'm showing knowledge of the game industry. Nobody delays a game for no reason. This has nothing to do with bias. Hell, I'm not that interested in Pikmin so there's no reason for me to defend it.

 

A game breaking bug could have been found.

Assets could not have been able to be done in time

They wanted to fine tune everything to perfection

 

It could be one of any number of things

 

Nobody does ANYTHING for 'no reason'. I don't believe I've said anythings been done for 'no reason'. It's YOU who aren't providing ANY reasons for the delay except saying 'we don't know why'. Of course we don't know why, but I'm saying the fault entirely rests with Nintendo. Again, I'm not saying there's no reason; I'm just saying I can't see any GOOD reason for it. The common things that would cause delays are usual external factors, none of which really apply here because it's ALL Nintendo. This isn't to do with the industry(and you've already said you DON'T know what specific developers processes are), this game isn't particularly reliant on anything or anyone else in the industry is it? It's a Nintendo made game, published by Nintendo, for Nintendo's own system. Even if it was using a 3rd party engine, that would already exist. If it's a custom engine, then they'll be doing it themselves/that would be accounted for in the development process. Not to mention the engine would have had/should have had to have been completed if they were going to announce the title as a launch title. The Wii U reveal was relatively close to its release, and a third pikmin game has been rumoured since well back into the Wii days - that's admittedly not indicative of anything here; but Nintendo would have had the jump on everything nonetheless. As for your reasons;

 

 

A game breaking bug being found - that's shoddy work on NINTENDO'S part in their game creation process. They should allow for this in development and take into account debugging. Yes game breaking bugs can occur, but if NINTENDO have been careful along the way there shouldn't be anything to go so unnoticed for so long that it causes such a huge delay now. They aren't exactly new to the game business either, are they?

Assets could not have been able to be done in time - and who's fault would that be? Poor planning on NINTENDO'S part. Who was responsible for the assets? NINTENDO were. Who announced the game as a launch title? NINTENDO did.

They wanted to fine tune everything to perfection - again, if it's taking them this long to do this, then it's NINTENDO's fault and poor planning. I already mentioned the possibly more skeptical view that they announced the game with full knowledge it wouldn't be ready in a way to try and future sell the Wii U. If things weren't close to ready, why announce it? It's not like NINTENDO wouldn't have known if NINTENDO'S game wasn't close to ready.

 

 

Essentially, and you seem to be missing this, they have no good excuse. The people to blame here are NINTENDO. Everything involved as far as I can tell is within their control. If all the control rests with them - they dropped the ball. I'm not saying it got delayed for no reason, I'm saying it got delayed because Nintendo are turning into a joke. They can't even get their own games for their own systems out on time - how are they supposed to set an example for the future of the console?

 

As for Game and Wario and Wii Fit U, I can't recall to hand, but were they not too announced as launch window? What exactly ARE Nintendo doing at the moment?

 

Next thing I'd wonder, if Project 101, purported to be similar in some aspects, is released before Pikmin - will it cause any conflict in sales?

[Hero-of-Time]

Next thing I'd wonder, if Project 101, purported to be similar in some aspects, is released before Pikmin - will it cause any conflict in sales?

 

I've always thought these games needed to be released far apart due to the reason you stated. With Pikmin down as July/August in the other regions, I expect W101 to drop around Oct/Nov time, which would make it a year late.

 

As for Game and Wario and Wii Fit U, I can't recall to hand, but were they not too announced as launch window? What exactly ARE Nintendo doing at the moment?

 

Indeed they were. No idea what's going on with either of them. They are hardly AAA games ( can't think of a better term ) that require a massive amount of time or graphical power.

[RedShell]

Game development isn't as straight forward as some people seem to think it is, even for incredibly experienced/large teams, there's always going to be things going wrong, stuff that needs changing/fixing etc...

 

Nevertheless, we shouldn't just assume that the delay with Pikmin 3 is purely down to negative issues like those, what if they're taking some extra time to add more content, or simply improve aspects of the game?

 

You can't really put that down to bad planning on Nintendo's part. If additional ideas come up during the development process (not exactly difficult given the nature of game development), then surely holding the game back in order to implement that stuff is the correct decision in the long run, right?

[Hero-of-Time]

You can't really put that down to bad planning on Nintendo's part. If additional ideas come up during the development process (not exactly difficult given the nature of game development), then surely holding the game back in order to implement that stuff is the correct decision in the long run, right?

 

Yes and no. If a game is ok without needless padding then just get it out, especially if your console is chugging along. If it is something that generally will add to the experience then yeah add away.

 

Again this wouldn't be an issue if the Wii U was selling and had plenty of titles to play. At the moment many people who snapped up a Wii U are disappointed with how long this and the other Nintendo titles are taking to get out the door, especially when they were down as launch window games.

 

As I said earlier, it doesn't really bother me at the moment, but I can see why people are all up in arms over the situation.

[Jonnas]

Again, I'm not saying there's no reason; I'm just saying I can't see any GOOD reason for it.

 

Here's the thing, though, if you look at the two likeliest motives for a delay:

 

-Game Development needs polishing/debugging/content: We can't see the reason. Nobody will give us anything concrete until the game is finished and the developers are answering questions.

-The game is done, ulterior motives delay it: This is not a good reason, even when it is, because consumers never see it as such.

 

So, what sort of answer would please you in this situation?

 

The common things that would cause delays are usual external factors, none of which really apply here because it's ALL Nintendo.

 

No. Delays and cancellations can be caused due to hiccups in development. It happens all the time. Yes, even when close to completion (hell, I remember the development of Street Fighter 2 HD Remix finding unexpected hiccups when resizing the sprites, and that was a small project)

 

A game breaking bug being found - that's shoddy work on NINTENDO'S part in their game creation process. They should allow for this in development and take into account debugging. Yes game breaking bugs can occur, but if NINTENDO have been careful along the way there shouldn't be anything to go so unnoticed for so long that it causes such a huge delay now. They aren't exactly new to the game business either, are they?

 

That's the funny thing about bugs: they never exist in theory until you check and see that they do. You know, in the final stages of development.

 

Bugs aren't caused by shoddy work. Lack of testing is the only shoddy thing that can ever happen in this situation.

 

Essentially, and you seem to be missing this, they have no good excuse. The people to blame here are NINTENDO. Everything involved as far as I can tell is within their control. If all the control rests with them - they dropped the ball. I'm not saying it got delayed for no reason, I'm saying it got delayed because Nintendo are turning into a joke. They can't even get their own games for their own systems out on time - how are they supposed to set an example for the future of the console?

 

The funny thing is that your reaction is exactly why Nintendo avoids announcing anything ahead of time these days. Hence the lack of announcements that turned them into a "joke" in the first place.

[Captain Falcon]

Of one thing we can be certain of, is that Nintendo almost always delays games for the sake of actually finishing them, no marketing or other ulterior motives behind it. The only exception I can think of is Twilight Princess, but I seriously doubt that the reasons that got that one delayed also apply to Pikmin 3.

 

Going back further than H-o-T went, both Pokemon Stadium games were purposely delayed. The first was delayed in the US from November/December '99 to March 2000 because they didn't want it to steal thunder from DK64 and they had a bit of a baren lineup early in the new year - consquently, we got it only a month later despite having the GB game for much less time. Pokémon Stadium 2 was held back in Europe because of the extra time it took Gold and Silver to reach here - the game was ready to go but they wanted sales of Gold and Silver to come in first and to allow people to get familar with the new rules and techniques before using them in a Stadium game.

Edited April 18, 2013 by Captain Falcon

[Rowan]

I wonder if them releasing it in August won't have as much of a difference sales wise than if it was sold in June knowing that a) the Pikmin fan will buy it regardless of when it's out and b) it doesn't have mainstream appeal. It could be that they don't have many Wii U games released in the summer so they're trying to pad it out before the winter lineup.

 

My honest opinion about Nintendo struggling with HD is that it shouldn't be an excuse. They've had years to prepare for the jump to HD and are able to ask for experience and advice from other developers. It just comes off as bad planning. On the flip side, whatever engine the Galaxy runs on I could easily believe it's a HD engine scaled down to SD.

[Grazza]

Yeah, I have to say I agree with what @Jonnas and @RedShell are saying. I just don't smell a rat with Pikmin 3. The last delay I was annoyed at was Twilight Princess, but I genuinely don't think they've done anything like that since. We can argue perhaps Nintendo polishes games too much nowadays - after all, they used to seem to go from crude to finished pretty quickly; now they go from polished, to more polished, to even more polished!

 

But the most likely explanation is that Nintendo is simply struggling with HD, which hurts them more than anyone. Let's hope they get used to it and we're all blown away by many more classics.

[Dcubed]

I wonder what happens when Pink Pikmin carry an object while other Pikmin are trying to help...

[Jonnas]

I wonder what happens when Pink Pikmin carry an object while other Pikmin are trying to help...

 

Oh my god... I so want to see Pikmin dangling from the bottom while the pink ones are carrying objects on air

[Dcubed]

Oh my god... I so want to see Pikmin dangling from the bottom while the pink ones are carrying objects on air

 

It'll be even better when you have 10 Pink Pikmin trying to carry one fatty Purple one