Nintendo's DS Challenge

So, I was chatting online today with a friend of mine, and as we often do, we began trying to unravel the enigma that is Nintendo. I felt that we hit on some key points that Nintendo needs to address with its new handheld, and figured I'd post our comments up here to share with everyone else. Here 'goes:

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FRIEND: Did you see Advanced Wars DS? It freakin' looks exactly like the GBA version.

ME: Yeah, I noticed that. To tell you the truth though, I'd rather see sharp-looking 2D games on DS than N64-quality 3D ones. Either way, it's not a very competitive place for them to be.

FRIEND: Overall, it seems that Nintendo's DS titles aren't reviewing that well these days... actually, their games in general are scoring lower.

ME: Yeah -- although I do really like Wario Ware Touched and Yoshi's Touch and Go. On GameCube, Donkey Kong Jungle Beat is also really fun. I think that Nintendo's got two things working against them: 1) some of their franchise games have fallen short (especially Star Fox Ass), and 2) they make a lot of arcade-style games now that aren't meant to be very deep, and are tough to score on a traditional review scale.

FRIEND: I think that is the problem -- they seem to be moving away from the long sort of experiences because they feel that the mainstream market doesn't want that, and moving towards shorter, simpler arcade stuff.

ME: I think there's room for both, as long as the quality is high and the pricing reflects the replay value. They are spreading themselves too thin though, amongst so many platforms. I think most fans would rather have those three or four "mega games" from Nintendo every year rather than a bunch of simpler ones.

FRIEND: But then everyone complains that there aren't enough games. Nintendo just needs to bulk up and make more standard games. They obviously know that they can't rely on much 3rd party, so they need to suck it up and really do a big push. Also, I get confused by the DS because games like Yoshi look kiddie in design but are a bit challenging for young kids to actually grasp the idea and be able to play it.

ME: Yeah, Nintendo's sending mixed messages: "With DS, everyone goes back to the starting line -- you don't have to be a game expert to play!" Then they take standard game types and make them tougher to play with a stylus. And, try explaining to a non-gamer how to even use the thing. Yoshi's and Wario Ware are decent examples of how their strategy COULD work, but you're right, Yoshi's is too frantic right off the bat. I thought a non-gamer friend of mine might like it, but by the time I got around to explaining how to make bubbles around enemies, their brain had already retreated.

FRIEND: Exactly... I was trying to get someone to play, too.

ME: Animal Crossing and Nintendogs will be great games to go after casuals and female gamers, but those titles are the exception to the rule. If Nintendo wants to make any real headway with those crowds, the need to keep their message consistent -- either you play totally new types of games on the DS or you don't. If someone buys the system and picks up any games other than the two or three that are actually good and show off the systems' features, they're immediately turned off.

FRIEND: Yeah, those two you mentioned should hopefully win over more casual gamers.

ME: The DS ads are ass, too. Here you've got this product where your top challenge is to explain to people what it is, and the ads don't even show the damn thing in action.

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And from there we went back to gushing over the PSP. Let's hope that Nintendo shows how much smarter they've gotten at E3 in May!