E3 2017: Keys to Victory

In pay per view boxing matches, there is something called "keys to victory" which is a small pre-fight analysis of what each boxer needs to do in order to maximize his chances of winning. Today we are going to once again use that format to do a little analysis and see what each company needs to do in order to get that "winner of E3" title.

Why is winning E3 a big deal? Well, when a company "wins" an E3 event the grand prize is lots of hype and most often than not hype traduces itself into sales and sales very often turn into good games been considered for the platform in the near future. So without any further delay, lets see what each company needs to do in order to win it.

Microsoft

Up until now, Microsoft has had a really tough first half of the year. Looking on the bright side, the Xbox One has been getting good initiatives like the Netflix-like gaming service, but without many games to keep its user base engaged it has remained quite cold in the house of Xbox. In order to win this year's E3 their strategy has to be to push the Scorpio along with a barrage of exclusive games. Seen a revival of Scalebound as a Scorpio exclusive will sting a little (if you own an Xbox One), but would be a valid strategy. Other big games that could be revived are Fable and even KOTOR (Star Wars: Knights of the old republic). Once again the key for them is variety as the Gears-Forza-Halo combo will not be able to carry their new system to where they want it to be. They need to re-shape their fan base into something that welcomes more types of games and this E3 event is a great chance for them to do so.

Strength: Having a new machine to show gives them an edge if they know how to use it.

Weakness: Consumer confidence is quite low considering the poor first half of the year that the Xbox One had.

Sony

Sony is in a complex situation. They had a wonderful first half of 2017 with a parade of great third party games, but with few announcements and rumors in the last 5 months and with Final Fantasy 7 remake and Kingdom Hearts having difficulties it looks as if they have spent most of their bullets and are now facing a drought. With their situation been like it is... Can they win it this year? The answer to that question is yes, but they need to prove that the drought is not coming and that we have something to look forward to in the next 5 months. We all know that new gameplay will be shown of some games that were already announced, but if we don't get some cool surprises along with some solid release dates, we might have a so-so conference at best. The pressure is on them to keep the ball rolling.

Strength: Great first half of 2017 has the consumer as happy as they can be. The overall attitude is positive and many expect Sony to have an ace under their sleeve as they have done for the last 3 years.

Weakness: Expectations are so high that Sony will have a hard time topping themselves and anything less than what's expected could be seen as dim and uneventful. 

Nintendo

Right now, Nintendo is having a great time. Their gamble with the Switch paid off and they are as we speak a very close second to the PS4, month after month since the Switch was released. Now, the problem for them with this years E3 is that most of their surprises have once again (like last year) been either leaked or announced on ahead of time, leaving them with little mystery and intrigue, things that are needed in this type of event in order to have a big impact on the audience. 

Another fact is that even with the success they are having, they still won't give a big conference and once again rely on their Nintendo Direct videos, which are cool, but don't have that extra "umph!" that big time conferences give. So if things are like this then what does Nintendo need to win? The best bet they have is having secret stuff that they can use to blow us away when they are finally mentioned or showing what they have in a brilliant way, so they can lure us into the hype train. How can they do this? Well, details about the Splatoon 2 and Arms tournament can be a good start along with details about their Netflix-like retro game service and maybe one or two new Switch games that haven't been announced.

Strength: Great momentum since the Switch was released, even bigger that the one they had with the Wii in 2006.

Weakness: Unless they have some good secrets to unveil, everything new about the big N is already known.

Wrapping things up:

E3 Fight Forecast

This years E3 will be a good one with solid game play and maybe a few surprises in a really close fight between the main competitors, but try not to expect a "dreams come true" hype fest like the last one, because it is very unlikely. Let's just enjoy what we will get and get excited about the things that will be announced while hoping that the momentum that 2017 brought can last for a long time. 

Why hating on the Nintendo Switch is stupid

I normally don't rise in defense of any corporate product (believing that the companies themselves must do that with their policies), but this time I will make an exception as I don't really understand all the hate and saltiness that has been going on ever since the Nintendo's presentation of the Switch. So today, I am going to shoot down some misconceptions about Nintendo's new console that the trolls and haters are using to discredit the whole platform before it even begins. Be aware that I am not going to bash on arguments that are solid (there are a few of them out there), but the misconceptions that are just plain silly.

Now we are ready, so let's do this!

-Misconception #1:
The Switch is under-powered omg lulz...

Status: Wrong!
It may not be as powerful as the PS4 or Xbox One, but games still look quite good and while it will lose graphical power when on handheld mode, the size of the screen will make up for it. Besides, games like Super Mario Odyssey and Xenoblade 2 have a lot of detail on them, details that are been neglected in order to have something to rant about. If you thought that for the price you would be getting a portable PS4/Xbox One then you have lost touch with reality. Now talking about pricing...

-Misconception #2:
The price of the Switch is outrageous, it's the end of the world!

Status: Wrong!
The pricing while it is not the cheapest expected (which was $250), It is quite fair for what it's been offered. This hybrid console does a lot and promises a lot in terms of games so its value will increase really quick after it is launched. By the way, the gaming industry pundits that have been saying it should had been a $200 dollars price tag are maybe living on Jupiter or something because we all know that Nintendo never sells at a loss.

Another thing to take into account that the PSP and PSVITA at their respective launch days costed from 250 to 300 dollars which roughly translates to $300 or more of today's money. All of this makes this complaint to be nothing more than a simple pout because they wanted it cheaper. Underestimating the value of a product based on cheapness is not a professional thing to do.

-Misconception #3:
Paying for an online service? *sobs* we will die... Nintendo is the devil!

Status: Wrong!
The Nintendo online service becoming a paid one reminds me of that moment when Sony decided to do the same thing and everybody was moaning and complaining. Guess what? Now everybody is paying up their PS+ service nicely and it has become a lot more stable when compared to the times when it was free. Here's a tip: When you are devoid of facts then silence becomes a virtue.


-Misconception #4:
The free games on Nintendo's online service will only be available for a month, we are doomed!

Status: Debatable
How can some people use this statement when we don't even know the price that the service will have? We will have it for free until fall, so wait until they reveal more information before starting a pout fest about it.

Remember when all we had for the N64 were these 2 games? We were kids and nobody complained.

-Misconception #5:
The Switch starting lineup is just too small in terms of big games, yuck.

Status: Wrong!
Did people who said this ever thought back to the PS4 and Xbox One launch days? Big games could be counted with the fingers on one of your hands (I still remember all the jokes about it). If we go back to the past the Nintendo 64 launched with only 2 games, The Dreamcast had 4, The Saturn had 4, The Game Cube had 3, The PS2 while official lists have more than 10, we mostly had Fantavision on all stores along with Ridge Racer and Kessen for a long time. Bottom line been that a slow start doesn't mean a bad platform, get your facts straight before complaining.


-Misconception #6:
The switch library is poor, I rather play an Ngage trolololo...

Status: Wrong!
I know variety in gaming taste is a thing, but I cannot help but feel that this complaint is entirely empty and just serves as a tool for trolling. We have one of the most beautiful Legend of Zelda games ever made, we have Mario returning to its Mario 64 roots, a new Xenoblade game, Splatoon been a sequel rather than a simple port, new cool projects from Atlus and Square Enix, a cool classic Street Fighter to take on the go, Bomberman is coming back and can now take Skyrim and even Sonic Mania on the go too and this is all bad? I know some of us are dying for a new Metroid and Fzero game, but let the console run its course before talking trash, because the Switch game library is not bad, it is actually quite excellent.

-Misconception #7:
The new Mario game is a rip off of Sonic Adventure hur hur hur *burp*

Status: Wrong!
So let me see if I understand. People saying this are mostly old schoolers who want some of the old stuff coming back (I am a Sega fan myself) so now when a game comes that borrows from the style we know and love we complain about it? It doesn't make sense at all, it's ironic and kind of dumb if you ask me. Let me clarify something before I press on. If you take this from a good point of view and see it as a curiosity rather than something to complain about then this one is not for you.


-Misconception #8:
Nintendo is still for kids hue hue hue...

Status: Wrong!
Yeah well if Nintendo is still for kids I want you to give a Xenoblade game to a kid and see him go through it. When Super Mario Odyssey releases give it to a kid and see how far he/she goes without something holding his/her hand this time. Go ahead and recommend the expected No More Heroes game for Switch to a kid and see how well you do and while you are at it give some infant the Project Octopath game and see how he/she understands the game's story and battle systems. The Nintendo is for kids joke died with the Wii, get on with the times.

Wrapping things up:
I know I look like some sort of Nintendo fanboy, but believe me I am not. I wrote this article not in defense of Nintendo itself, but in defense of the optimism we need in order to see good things happen in the industry. I am all for bringing back the enthusiasm of the days of old, when gamers had a lot more cohesion, hope and illusion around new releases rather than the current sand storms and pouting festivals. I hope I cleared some points by shooting down these misconceptions for all of those who are confused by the trolls and haters. Thanks for reading and keep on gaming!

Game Doctrine E3 Special

Game Doctrine is a little side project I have been working up with a friend and what better way to introduce our little wacky antics than I showing you our E3 special. If you don't understand some aspects of this episode you can look for previous ones so you can see what it is all about, hope you all enjoy it.

Game Doctrine is shaping up to be a channel that mixes up gaming discussion and criticism with a simple storyline and lots of extras that will be added as we go. I know we have a lot to improve, but we are working to make this a better channel and have lots of ideas that we will be implementing in the future. If you liked the video then help us out by liking, subscribing and sharing the video as it will be of great motivation to us.

E3 2015 - Keys to Victory

We are basically 15 days away from this year E3 event and the stakes couldn't be higher. Sony has a big lead in the console war, but the PS4 is running the risk of becoming slow in the sense that their biggest guns are not ready and demand for new games has become very intense. Microsoft has been on the losing side for the last couple of years, only managing to win some months in terms of sales, but the lack of powerful games in the past could lead them to give gamers a lot of good news that have been building up until now. On the other hand, Nintendo has been recovering little by little, relying on their solid fan base. Don't get me wrong, we all know that the Wii U is still struggling (even though it is a very good console with a good game library), but it has at least gathered enough power to survive.

Now let's see what needs to happen for any of the companies to win...

Pros:

• Expectations, having the chance to announce a lot of exclusives.
• The Xbox One fanbase is still strong.

Cons: 

• Out of the Xbox One fanbase, morale is low and people are clearly thinking that Microsoft only cares about certain genres. 
• Many gamers feel left out and have no strong reason that could justify buying the console.

Keys to Victory
In order to win the E3 battle, Microsoft must come up with an attractive offer, not only to their long time fans, but to other gamers too. For example, if all of their announcements are about shooters and sports, the possibilities for them to end up victorious are greatly diminished because neutral gamers (potential buyers at this point) will feel left out and because of this, Microsoft will find themselves in the same place they did last year.

Another thing that they should use to lift themselves over the others would be to take a lost franchise and revive it. The Silent Hill rumor was proven to be false, but it wouldn't surprise me if the higher ups at Microsoft have given Konami a couple calls after seen how gamers reacted on the web making this an opportunity that could make them win this year E3. Other options for them would be to give some love to their own flagship franchises like Gears of War and Alan Wake (which has a small chance of ending up on PS4) in order to use these fan favorites as reinforcements for their new projects (by keeping the platform relevant to their fans while trying to win new ones).

Bottom line
This year it is all about games with Microsoft and they need to have quite a bombing run in order to pull up the Xbox One from the fact that they are lagging behind by more than 10 million units. If they do this right, they can take the E3 event by storm, but if they don't then it will be just another year of them falling behind Sony in the console race.

Sony
Pros: 

• A great market advantage and popularity.
• Gamers still believe in Sony's promise of bringing a new PS2 era.

Cons:

• Their first party lineup for the rest of the year looks weak.
• Most of the previous big announcements are for games in 2016 or have no release date at all.
• Sony is still carrying the burden of past mishaps (the christmas DDOS attacks, Driveclub issues, The Order 1886 failing to meet the expectations of the mainstream crowd).

Keys to Victory

Sony needs to have some big announcements for this E3 event or else they will have a very hard time. For starters they should at least show some game play of Uncharted 4 in order to keep their fan base all hyped off and to prove that the game will be worth the wait. They should also prove that they will have a lot of third party games that the Xbox One doesn't have (mostly from Japanese studios) and that these games can cover up for the fact that the PS4 first party lineup looks kind of empty for 2015.

They also need for their conference to be fun and dynamic because last year it looked as if they could learn a thing or two from Nintendo who has changed their image from dull goobers back to the trolls they used to be in the 90's and this means less of the "boring politician" style and more of a radical feel to it. Another thing that they should also improve in their conference offering is to talk more about games and less about statistics.

Another thing that Sony needs to do is to unleash their speculated franchises unto their fans. Many PS4 users are eager to hear about the new Gravity Rush game as well as the rumored (and apparently fake) Medevil game that took the net by storm because of some picture, so there you have two possible heavyweights. Now last but not least if they really want to give their E3 conference the equivalent of a nuclear bomb, then they should show something about legendary non-existent (at least for now) games like The Last Guardian or maybe revive Crash Bandicoot or Legend of the Dragoon at least. Yeah I know that those last 3 games I mentioned are very unlikely to happen, but hey we can still hope.

Bottom line
For Sony to hold this year E3, they need to keep reassuring gamers that the "PS2 era" that they promised to unleash on the PS4 is still happening. If things are like Andrew House said and 2015 is more of a year of investment and planting seeds for the future, then they need to give us a glimpse of that future or else skepticism will hurt all that they have managed to achieve up to this point.

Pros:

• Fanbase is as solid as ever.
• The Wii U has gone from nothing, to now having the most interesting exclusive game lineup in the console wars.
• Nintendo has recovered from the slump they were into and now they are looking at profits again even though the Wii U console itself it still lagging behind.

Cons:

• Haven't been able to convince enough skeptics to give a chance to the Wii U.
• Legend of Zelda U was delayed and some key games still have no release date.

Keys to Victory

Nintendo is in a very good position for this year E3 even though the fact that they delayed the Legend of Zelda for the Wii U may push you to think otherwise. The first thing that Nintendo needs to do in their E3 Nintendo Direct is to be as straight forward as they can and show the games they have been teasing us about for a long time. We need to see more about games like the Shin Megami Tensei / Fire Emblem crossover, the new Star Fox game for the Wii U, See a little bit more about Mario Maker and of course, finally get release dates for Xenoblade Chronicles X and the new Fatal Frame localization to the west. 

For Nintendo to be able to get a hold of this year E3 (which would be a back to back win, considering that they "won" last year) they need to make their presentation to be both informative and exciting at the same time. So they should once again start with a bit on the wacky side as they did last year and follow through with updates on their games, coupled with some new announcements in order to keep the fan base interested and well seated on the hype train. 

As for the Nintendo World Championships, they need to be as impressive as the one in the 90's or better. We need to see the Nintendo of old still living and breathing in this modern era and I think that the Championships are a good way to show it. If the championship ends up been an over the top event, then it will add up to their whole E3 efforts in a very good way.

Botom line

Nintendo has a real chance here to continue their climb up to the minds of Skeptics that up to this point still believe that Nintendo is only for kids. For Nintendo, this year E3 has to be all about placing themselves in front of the competition and displaying their might for all of us to see, which means showing the games that their platform has and the others don't. If they go around it passively, they will not defend their past year win, so they need to come as strong as possible while giving it that hilarious Nintendo twist that they had accustomed us to in their previous recent offerings. 

So in the end... Who will win?

Like in a sporting event, the game isn't over until its over so predicting a winner is not a wise move. I personally expect Microsoft to come up swinging, Sony keeping a well hidden surprise to us and Nintendo doing their thing without any problems at all. In the end it all comes down to who can shock us or at least give us more enjoyment with their announcements so that #1 spot is still up for grabs.

A New Nintendo Console - 6 Keys to Victory

There has been a faint rumble recently about Nintendo already working on a new console. This is like the humming sound before the earthquake, so before more news and speculations start to pop up on the net, let's see what are the keys to victory of such a console.

1) An inspiring name
This was the worst defect that the Wii U had to live with, as most Wii owners thought it was just another version of the same console instead of an entirely new one. This time they need to let go of the family oriented "good guys" approach and focus on making their new console to be seen as something badass. Back when the Wii was still a work in progress, it was pretty popular with its working title that was "Nintendo Revolution". People liked that name a lot, some of them were already calling it "Revo" and other abbreviated versions of the name. Sadly there was a huge sigh of disappointment when Nintendo finally showcased their console and called it Wii, losing part of what made it look like something serious to the public.

2) An equally inspiring merchandising effort
We have to admit that Nintendo is already changing the tone of their marketing campaign right now with the Wii U. They don't look like goobers anymore as they are changing and little by little catering more and more to the hardcore crowds (The Reggie vs Iwata fight video is proof of this). Nintendo is finally realizing who their fans are and how these fans feel and react about their games and decisions. Hopefully they learned their lesson and will keep improving their style when promoting their new console.

3) Powerful hardware / bigger console design
It has been said that the Wii U processing power was capped at some point because it made the console to overheat, meaning that they would had to put a bigger and louder cooling system (fans) which was contradictory to the console's overall design. This time around they should drop the small console approach and make it bigger so it can have a cooling system that can handle a bigger amount of power. I am not implying that the new Nintendo console should be as big as an old VCR player, but they should at least try to find the best of both worlds because they need to give Sony and Microsoft a run for their money in terms of power.  

4) A definitive game at launch
Coming with a console in the middle of a console generation can be the equivalent of trying to stop a running train by stepping in the tracks and extending your arm, but if Nintendo can give the right impression from the beginning they not only re-introduce themselves in the console race, but also could be able to take down at least one of the giants. One way of re-entering the console war with a bang would be to have a definitive title from the very start. Assuming that the console has enough power, we could have a new entry in the Metroid Prime saga that can blow us away with its visuals, story and even more so if it has VR headset support. They could also join the fray with an RPG from the Xenoblade series or even a big surprise like a Mega Man game (thing that could make Nintendo to take the look of a hero in the eyes of millions of players worldwide). This time around bringing a Super Mario Bros game from the start will not work, if they want to succeed they need to beat the other companies at their game.

5) Keep up the cooperative efforts
Hyrule Warriors and Bayonetta 2 are examples of how well cooperative works are for Nintendo. If they can keep that up with the new console, we can expect tons of exclusives that won't be so expensive to make, but can still become instant hits. It is true that sales figures are not off the charts for the two examples I mentioned, but if these games would had been released at launch, the story would had been very different. This type of cooperative endeavor can do many things from reviving dead franchises to making cool spin off games and interesting crossovers. It is a fresh way of making business that can serve Nintendo well if they know how to use it.

6) Open to a worldwide market
This one is very important as it is one of those things that is already limiting the potential of the Wii U. First, the concept of region blocked games has to be ditched in order for the new console to be a good product on an open market. Censorship has no place in gaming as it only serves as a limitation to gamers and as a hindrance to profit. Another thing Nintendo has to improve is the way they deal with Japanese games. They should stop limiting so many of them to Japanese audiences only and start to bring more of those games to the west. Fatal Frame IV and the new Fatal Frame (which is on Wii U) are big examples of this problem, which is a self-defeating posture that must be changed before the new console is released.

Wrapping it up
Nintendo once again has a good chance here, but it will take a lot of effort to actually make it right. Any mistake will prevent them from turning skeptics into believers so they must be careful, but effective. It's all about precision up to this point, so the big N has to take everything they learned with the Wii U and use it in order to become a real competitor once again.

5 Retro Characters That Could Had Been In The New Smash Bros Game.

The new Super Smash Bros is already out there (3DS version) and it has proven to be another great addition to the series. This franchise is basically the most famous one that Nintendo has and it causes quite a stir when we talk about what characters should be in it. Nintendo has always stated that characters that appear on Smash Bros have to be ones that have appeared in a Nintendo platform at any point in time so the list is endless. We all know that from the nostalgic point of view retro characters have precedence over current ones, so today we are going to see 5 retro characters that would had been cool to have on this new Smash Bros game.

1) The Boy (from A Boy and his Blob on NES and Wii)

The original "A Boy and his Blob" game is considered a great classic and its main character duo would had made for a very versatile fighter in Smash Bros. This is because the boy can use his blob for pretty much anything, making him a more interesting character than Rosalina who has her Luma as her sidekick. Think about it for a second, using the blob to attack, guard and do special moves by morphing it into various objects is something that would had made this character to be very fun to use. Many things come to mind when we think of potential moves. For example if you were to be falling down, you turn the blob into a ladder and climb back to safety or if you needed a quick weapon then you could turn the blob into a sword, shield or projectile. Possibilities are endless with this one.

Speed: Med - Defense: Low - Power: High

Final Smash: Turning the blob into a giant bowling ball, rolling it in the direction he is facing and decimating anything it touches.

2) Billy Lee (Double Dragon)

We already have a hand to hand specialist in the form of Little Mac, but it wouldn't had hurt to have the most famous of the Lee brothers joining the fight. This one would had been similar to Little Mac, but a lot more controllable as Little Mac tends to fall out of the stage a lot if you get carried away with the special moves. Billy Lee would not only be able to use his martial art moves, but also have special moves that include the use of various weapons that appear on the original game like the nunchaku, whip or bat. Billy trademark grapple would had to make an appearance too as many players loved using it in the original game. It would also be very cool if Billy had his whirlwind kick as a risky move to clear the area (sort of like Kirby's block attack). 

Speed: Low - Defense: Med - Power: Med

Final Smash: Two big Abobo enemies appear on stage, following enemies and punching them into oblivion.

3) Ryu Hayabusa (from the classic NES games)

One of the coolest things about the classic Ninja Gaiden games were the anime cutscenes they featured which was something that wasn't common in games at the time. In Smash Bros, we could have the anime styled Ryu Hayabusa that appeared on those cutscenes using the whole assortment of powers and weapons that he had in the classic games, but with a little less speed than Greninja. Other than the moves and weapons, one cool feature that Ryu could have is to be able to climb the wall if he's falling and somehow can get to it in time, the downside been that you could be knocked down if hit while climbing and haven't gotten to the ledge yet.

Speed: Med - Defense: Low - Power: High

Final Smash: The Jaquio appears and starts throwing big lighting spheres across the stage, severely damaging your enemies.

4) Bill Rizer (Contra)

By seen Bill Rizer in the list you may be thinking that it would be kind of unfair to have a character that has a machine gun all time, but it is not. Bill would be a slower but more powerful version of Snake (Super Smash Brothers Brawl), only using his equipment at some occasions and with a limited range. He would also be able to change his weapon into some of the special ones he finds in the original games and use small grenades like Snake does. He would also be able to double jump and prone (shoot while lying on the ground) to compensate for his lack of speed. His gun attacks will also had to be be very strong to keep up in the fight against faster opponents.  

Speed: Low - Defense: Med - Power: High

Final Smash: Bill makes a call and in a second, a flurry of big missiles (like the ones on stage 4 in Contra III: The Alien Wars) blowing away any opponent they touch.

5) Simon Belmont (Castlevania)

Almost everybody agrees that Simon Belmont should be in Smash Bros and it is not a hard thing to justify considering that the franchise made its console debut with the NES and also that Super Castlevania IV is considered by many to be the best of the classic series. Simon would be a very interesting character to play with, as the whip gives him a good mid range attack and his assortment of sub-weapons can make for pretty good strategies to use against opponents. He would have limited jumping skills but would be able to cling and make an extra jump by whipping the edge of a wall or platform at the right time.

Speed: Med - Defense: Low - Power: Med

Final Smash: The Belmont's super attack of choice, the Grand Cross.

Wrapping it up:

It was once stated by Nintendo that Super Smash Bros would never become a fan service fest, but considering how the franchise roster has been evolving since Brawl we can see that the purist notion that they had is slowly vanishing and that we may see a lot of interesting character appearances in the future. Let's just hope that they keep up the good work of bringing some of our childhood video game heroes back to life. Who knows? Maybe the Wii U version has some nice surprises in store for us.

The West Fall From Grace With Japanese Imports

At some point in the past, we at the west were having a blast with Japanese imports. Most games had their version for the west be it with subs, dubs or even the all powerful multi-language feature that has become basically extinct in these days and the only games that were kept in Japan where the ones that were extremely strange in nature and had no market over here. It was an era where censors and marketing people were a little looser they are now. At the time, the market was more open in terms of risk taking and companies were all into been the most "bad-ass" rather than the extra profits and austerity that they show at our present time. At that point in gaming history we used to be showered with cool Japanese games that complemented our own locally made games.

So...What Happened?
Well, if you grew up with the previous scenario you may have noticed that we have become kind of secluded in terms of imported video games. Yeah, we have a local video game market that is quite strong, but that doesn't mean that we are not going to support games from the other side of the world. On this day and age, any Japanese publisher thinks about it like 1,000.000.000 times before making a simple localization that on the past would had been a no brainer. Just to give you an example, approximately 10 years ago, we got 3 Fatal Frame games, while today as of October 2014, people at Koei Tecmo said that they think that the new Fatal Frame game (Wii U) will be a Japan only release. All of this while survival horror is making a big comeback into the west market which makes this all to be painfully ironic.

If we talk about Japanese franchises that vanished from the west, Yakuza is a big one.

The problem with all this situation is that we are been starved of a lot of awesome games and nice things because of some really dumb misconceptions like:

1) Japanese games wont sell well in the west.
Answer to that: Nonsense! Just because one game of the series flopped in the past (for a plethora of other reasons) it doesn't mean that all of them will do so too. Most of the time some imports fail in the west because of bad marketing and the lack of advertising efforts. That notion that the west generally see Japanese games as weird is a dumb generalization that must stop. The really weird aspect of this misconception is that some Japanese games have a great chance of success because they resemble games that are popular on our side of the planet, but many publishers still refuse to localize them.

2) Japanese cultural references will not fit with the west.
Answer to that: Are you kidding me? I think that Japanese marketers need to take a look on how popular anime has become in the west, especially within North American and Latin American Audiences. Many series are huge in the west and many aspects of the Japanese/Korean cultures are revered on this side of the world, not only as video games, but television series, music and movies. You don't need to "predict" how are we going to react. If the game is fun or at least interesting then we will be able to handle it.

3) Their business models don't fit with the west.
Answer to that: This one looks as if it is enough reason to keep a game out of our turf, but if you see it from a deeper point of view you will notice that the whole gaming market presents different types of opportunities that are not limited to one type of consumer. There are several business practices available including platform exclusivity, extra deals favorable to the players or even the creation of extra content and/or game elements. It is understandable that their business model may differ with the popular ones on our side, but they can re-shape their current ones into something that can help them profit from releasing the game overseas instead of succumbing to their lack of faith in the occidental gamer.

So you want to play PS VITA games on your TV set? Nope, only in Japan.

O.k, but who's to blame then?
If we are going to point fingers the first ones to blame would be Japanese publishers themselves. In the last 10 years, many Japanese gaming companies began to radically change their games instead of evolving them into modern versions of their winning formula. This gave the false impression that we were just not interested in Japanese games anymore while the truth was that those erratic experiments they made were the ones that pushed the fans off some franchises that used to be quite popular. All of this just because they wanted their games to have an American feeling which is a complete betrayal of their original style and the wrong thing to do, as imitation meets failure more often that you may think.

Other ones that are to blame are the marketing people for these Japanese companies that have the mistaken notion that the west hate their games and the third and final piece of the blame game belongs to us, the western gamers. Why? because when one of the few Japanese imports actually reaches our shores, we cheer and all but still ignore it or just wait too much time to get it. Its like we like the game, but don't want to put our money where our mouths are and then we complain when they don't want to release games over here anymore.

This is one of the currently missing imports that saddens me the most.

Wrapping it up
We can once again be what we used to be for Japanese developers, but in order for that to happen we have to show our love for the games, rather than just speak about it and moan when the games fail to be released. It sounds harsh, but it is the truth because many of us old school gamers and Japanese game fans have become too complacent and haven't realized that we are not in the 90's anymore and that in the world we live in today, if there is no solid demand for a product, it wont happen. So we need to sober up from all the good times reminiscing and keep up with what is happening today if we want some good imports to come our way.

A Videogame Generation Without Consoles, A Curious but Unlikely Scenario.

Videogame generations have always been characterized by the existence of game consoles. The PC has always been there as a gaming platform, but what really brought the games closer to the common household were and still are stand alone gaming machines. Nowadays, some analysts have predicted that consoles will cease to exist very soon, some of them stating that the current home console generation will most likely be the last. Arguments supporting their point of view include the advent of mobile gaming and increasing production costs in a fragile economy. Most gamers just take those analysis as doom and gloom nonsense, but let's make a small analysis of our own and see what would it take for a console-less generation to happen and see how feasible or unfeasible it really is.

There are lots of gaming companies, but the focus is on the big 3 of the console market.

A Matter of Competition.

First of all, for a console-less generation to sucessfully happen companies will need to beef up competition to very intense levels because they would no longer have any hardware to support them. One way to do this is to increase the rate of platform exclusive games up to a point in which we receive no less than 5-8 exclusives per year. If this is not done, then we will have different first party cloud based game services featuring the same games. Another option they have is to get creative and give their cloud platform an edge by giving the players some out of the ordinary incentives to play their games. One example of this would be to feature special points with each unlocked achievement or trophy and let the player use those points to buy more games. Another good idea would be to have monthly competitions with real prizes, encouraging games to play on their platform, polish their skills and compete, be it directly (fighting games, first person shooters) or indirectly (game records, score, speed runs, etc). 

These are just two ideas that could make an interesting first party cloud gaming market and while it sounds like tons of fun for us as consumers, it is a nightmare for gaming companies if we see it from a financial point of view. In reality, exclusive game development is getting slower while multi-platforms are thriving and getting faster. On the other hand giving real and direct incentives to the players is something that is almost non-existent as companies are looking to spend less and earn more in a market that is not custom tailored for us players anymore. 

A pro-player environment is something they have been running from for a long time.

Features We Love, But Nightmares They Fear. 

Let's imagine for a while that consoles have already vanished and that every first party company has its own cloud gaming service. Would they implement pro-player features that would make their networks a lot friendlier or will they go the dictator's path and keep player convenience out of the loop? If everything is cloud based we as players will need things like an offline mode, game sharing, game trading and lending between users, remote play, etc. Some of these features are to be implemented in consoles (with offline play currently existing on Steam) but if we were talking about a completely cloud based environment then companies would get nervous about what freedoms they give us. Will they go ahead and implement compulsory DRM even though everybody hates it? Will they fear people tricking the system so much that they will force countless limitations on us? Even if they go the opposite way and give us a gaming paradise, will the publishers be o.k with this?

If these feared features are something that has been very controversial on consoles, imagine how would it be if everything were to be cloud based. The probabilities of a giant backlash/fiasco are enormous, especially if you take into account what happened to Microsoft at the beginning of the current generation. Remember this?  

Console-less Markets And Their Customer Friendly Ways

This one is all about game prices. Console-less markets like Steam, Origin, Humble Bundle thrive of the idea of low prices or even give whatever you want type of systems. On some occasions we see new games getting price cuts that would seem barbaric for the console market investors. Steam is a great example of this as on Valve's little gold mine, sometimes we can find gaming deals on big name games that are quite recent, especially on seasonal sales. This is because on a console-less market, the price of games is a little more tied to demand than on the traditional game selling environment. 

Many publishers would cringe on the idea of everybody getting their game for cheap so it is either this or (once again) give the players a strong incentive to buy your game at full price (something that doesn't involve X set of armor, a "special" vehicle or an extra weapon). They need to make people really want the game quick or else they will wait for a price drop and that would hurt their profits more than the Red Wedding (spoiler alert!) episode did to Game of Thrones viewers. 

Wrapping it up:

A console-less generation of games can happen and that is a truth that can't be denied, but just because something can be done it doesn't mean that it is a good idea for everybody. From the point of view of us the consumers, it can be quite nice and convenient, but from a business stand point it is a quite difficult task to do. Gamers are getting smarter in deciding how will they spend their money, so one little mistake can spell disaster and first party companies/publishers know this very well. So, to wrap things up let's say that a console-less gaming generation is NOT feasible unless we (the players) are the ones who dominate the market. If the men in business suits are good with that, then we could be having this as soon as the next generation comes, but if not, then we are not ready for this and will have to wait at least another 20 years to get it. 

Whatever Happened With Sadness

Now that survival horror games are back in style, let's talk about one of them that was aiming to be something revolutionary in the previous generation, but ended in development hell long before it could become a complete product. Back when the Nintendo Wii was soon to launch (and still labeled as "Nintendo Revolution"), there were a lot of promises that were never fulfilled. For example, there was supposed to be a beat them up game called Project Hammer which would had the player using the Wii remote to make the robotic hero swing his giant hammer and smash enemies and objects alike, but it never happened. The one we are going to talk today was supposed to be a survival horror game that would fully use the Wii motion control features in order to give the player a really immersive horror experience. That horror game that never came was called Sadness.

Using a female aristocrat as the main character in an horror game was an interesting approach
as it mixes the life of the rich and powerful with the sensible approach of a woman, this time a sister.

Sadness was going to be a survival horror game developed for the Wii by a Polish company called Nibris. The first thing everybody noticed was that game's graphics were going to be entirely in black and white, sort of like one of those really old horror movies, but without the cheesy parts or silent dialogues. The main character in the game was going to be a woman called Maria Lengyel who was an aristocrat from the Victorian times. The woman finds herself in a pinch after the train he was travelling in is derailed and now she has to protect her now blinded brother and press on as they go deeper into the darkness that fills the place while her brother begins to exhibit some strange and creepy behavior.

This live action concept looked very promising at the time.

In this game, the level of interaction was going to be its main focus with the player having to use full motion controls (not waggles) in order to protect Maria and her brother from harm. Examples of this were shown in live action concept videos where a woman was shown scaring off a pack of rats with a torch and protecting herself from the rain by using an umbrella. This was part of the promise of giving the player the freedom of using any object in the game to attack, defend or interact with the environment. Another part of the whole premise of Sadness was that there was going to be no HUD. The developers were aiming on giving the game a more cinematic feeling without HUD items or menus reminding you that it was just a game so, everything was supposed to feel as if it were a movie. To top things off, the game was going to feature a storyline with different branching points which would surely had led to different endings. All of this points out that as far as features go, Sadness would had been revolutionary if it were delivered as promised.

At first the game was been nicely treated with development updates coming at a monthly basis. A few concept art pictures and sketches were shown while the game was still in development and based on how they looked we can say that this game was going to have an environment a little similar to the one featured in The Order 1886 because of its old school European style. Enemies in this game had a mix of common and uncommon influences that could be seen in the few concepts that were shown. Some of them consisted of werewolves and even Slavic mythology creatures like Likho.

Sadness was starting to look like a game with a lot of promise, until they fell silent about it. Months went by and the Nibris website had the same pictures and videos with no updates whatsoever. Some years passed after their sudden silence and by 2010 Nibris ceased to exist as its parent company turned them into a coordinator, a decision that stopped all the projects they had been working with including Sadness. This was quite a disappointment to everybody who owned a Wii and was expecting to try this game as this was one of the very first concepts that promised to deliver the motion control revolution that Nintendo had promised.

A woman and her little brother, looking at this picture gives some sort of "The Last of Us" feeling.
I think these people were ahead of their time and could had made it big with this game.

Wrapping it up

Sadness is still nowhere to be found, but while it seems that the game is still in development hell, there are some articles like this one on Nintendo Life, that state that the game may be developed after all and released for the Wii U, so if you are still curious about how this game would had turned out, there is still hope. I personally expect it to be some kind of cross between The Last of Us, The Order 1886 and Clock Tower.

Some Gaming Concepts That Just Didn't Work

Innovation has always been a hard endeavor in the world of technology and gaming tech is not an exception. Through the many years that have passed since the first video game was ever made, we have seen a lot of fads that have come and gone. In this world we live in there is always a person with a lot of money and all sorts of "kind of cool" ideas, but not every one of those ideas gets realized to its full potential as some concepts either fail in the process or die before they can even exist. Following that lane of thought we are going to see some of those "high end" concepts in gaming that tried to be something awesome, but couldn't.

1) The Arcade Experience at Home

Time: Late 80's - Early 90's  

Reason for failure: Was too expensive for the common customer.

Back in the late 80's and through the 90's that thing we call arcades were the pinnacle of gaming. Anybody could get a simplified port for any of the game consoles existing at the time, but nothing was as smooth, good looking and over the top as the arcade games themselves. At this time, some people thought that the best way to go was to bring the arcade experience to our homes regardless of the cost and that was a big mistake. Yeah, the economy wasn't as bad as it is now, but nobody was going to break their wallets over expensive video game hardware that came with a limited library of games that were not that easy to find.

Take for instance the home version of the Neo Geo console or AES (Advanced Entertainment System). Releasing in 1990, it was an attempt to bring the arcade experience to our living rooms in a time where it was indeed a big thing. The performance of this console was excellent and the hottest SNK games were available for it, but it had only one problem and that problem was that in order to have the console you had to dish out $650 and an extra $100 - $300 for each game. That in today's money is the equivalent of $1,141 for the console and $175 to $526 for each game. Before becoming a home console, the AES could only be rented and it was mostly available to hotels or high profile customers. This means that SNK had no plans to re-engineer the console in order to make it cheaper and because of that it just ended been a dream machine that was too expensive for the common gamer to have.

Another example would be the Konix Multisystem. This one instead of trying to be a home console, it opted to be the arcade itself inside your living room. It was some sort of "arcade cabinet" that resembled the ones found in the arcades for games like Afterburner. It has a neat looking chair with all sorts of stuff attached to it and it promised great looking home console games with the added value of the arcade experience that was so famous at the time. This one was never released because the manufacture costs for it were so high, that the price tag would had been something almost impossible for the consumer.

2) Photo-realistic Gaming (the poor man's version)

Time: Early 90's  

Reason for failure: The "games" were in fact crappy movies with sad excuses for gameplay.

On our modern days we can see some games that show how far we have advanced in the graphics department, but while many of these games feature excellent visuals, we still have a little more time ahead of us before reaching photo-realistic graphics. Now, back at the early 90's Sega had other idea which was taking the games into the movie rather than taking the movie into the game. At the time, most of what we had seen on gaming visuals was limited to sprites and drawn backgrounds so they must have thought that changing that to movie style visuals would make such an impact that they would quickly become kings of the hill.

It all looked good in paper until you played the games and realized that you were watching a low quality B movie with certain parts where you could shoot stuff or had to press a certain button combination (quick time events). After the Sega CD was released, the first emphasis it had was on those kinds of "interactive movies" and while a small handful of those games got to a cult classic status, most of them just flopped. Taking the easy way into photo-realism in gaming was never going to work and it still wouldn't work even if we tried it with the technology of our present time.

3) The First Virtual Reality Attempts on Gaming
Time: The 90's
Reason for failure: Bad implementation or devices just been cheap gimmicks.

Since the beginning of the current console generation we have been hearing a lot about virtual reality headsets. Be it the Oculus Rift or Project Morpheus, these new devices promise to give us that VR experience that others have failed in the past. In fact, half-baked attempts at creating a virtual reality were the reason why VR was basically abandoned until now. Some people may argue that the technology needed to pull this off was still not there, but if you think a little about that point in time, you can see that first person shooters already existed and were pretty popular with the hardcore crowd along with other genres that had games that could work on a virtual reality environment. They just had a bad choice for games and/or hardware and that botched their attempt on VR.

The biggest example of this is the Virtual Boy. Nintendo tried to make something interesting in order to keep the fans at bay until the Nintendo 64 was ready to release, but made it all wrong and paid the price for it. At first their idea was brilliant, futuristic looking and hype inducing, but when gamers began to see what the Virtual Boy was really about the whole thing went "bomb om"! The games were in red and black instead of color, most of the game concepts were anything but virtual reality and the device itself had no ergonomics or aesthetics at all. All of this made caused the Virtual Boy to be a failure and a stain on virtual reality gaming.

Other people also tried to make similar devices like the dreaded R-Zone which was a butchered version of the Virtual Boy that consisted of a Tiger Electronics game running in red and black over a piece of plastic an inch or so away from one of your eyes. Other devices just tried to simulate VR by putting a normal game very close to your eyes like the Viktormaxx Stuntmaster or just trying some desperate old school 3D effect on an uncomfortable headset or googles like the Sega 3D Glasses.

Wrapping it up

Like it was said at the beginning of this article, Innovation is hard and it is a path that became the final resting place for many products, but these early attempts to try new things did not went in vain. Nowadays we have systems that emulate the feeling of the arcades pretty easily (even if you want to make you own cabinet, you can and it is not that expensive), gaming graphics have slowly evolved into something that almost resembles the real world (check how the Fox engine looks on the PT game demo) and virtual reality now has a fighting chance with the creation of new VR head sets that are showing lots of potential. Who knows what kinds of new crazy concepts will come at our present time. Maybe some of them will fail, but we can't rest assured that as long as we keep advancing we will always get there sooner or later.

Nintendo on mobile? They should, but not as you may be thinking.

There has been a lot of comments going on about the Nintendo executives and investors throwing tantrums over if the company should enter the mobile market or not. First of all let me get this out of the way. No, Nintendo should never let their franchises to go mobile because that would be the equivalent of creating a black hole in the middle of the company and it will consume it from the inside bringing a slow and painful death. As they are right now Nintendo is one of the few companies that is still (almost) pristine in their ways and unsullied from any business dirt that comes from selling out... Well, maybe except for the Mercedes-Benz thing in Mario Kart 8, but that's just one separate incident as Nintendo runs most of their business by themselves most of the time and this uniqueness is what keeps them afloat, even on tough times.

A mock picture of how a Nintendo "master app" could look like.

The thing is that Nintendo could make cool stuff for mobile without selling out their souls to mobile platforms just for a couple of extra bucks. Something like this should be no problem for the big N because mobile app development doesn't require big development teams or high budgets as it would only take a handful of resources and a relatively small development cycle. The best thing about this is that with content creators are brilliant as the ones they have, a great deal of interesting mobile applications can be created and unleashed to the public, giving Nintendo products some extra value without losing themselves in the process.

So a fan had to come and do what Nintendon't.

There are many possibilities about the mobile software they could make in order to support their consoles instead of attempting to replace them. For example, they could develop a support app for Mario Kart 8, sort of like the one someone actually made and was featured in Kotaku a couple days ago. They could also make official apps that give help in some games with mini guides and/or tips or even some sort of Nintendo World App (or something like that) that syncs with the Wii U and lets the user do all sorts of things like buying games, enter the Miiverse, add friends and that kind of stuff while on the go.

Imagine yourself using a smart phone to help a friend in the upcoming Star Fox game for the Wii U.

Other way of seen this is to go a little farther than plain game support apps. Good imaginative things like apps that lets you help or attack somebody within a game (sort of like the Watchdogs app) could make up for really fun situations if they do it with the right games. They could also make an app that features augmented reality games for the Amiibos that can generate coins or some kind of reward to be used on games or even the e-shop itself. The possibilities are endless if they take mobile approach from the sidelines and come up with interesting and fun materials that add up to the overall experience.

If they are planning to go "pay to win", they better reconsider before they spoil the whole thing.

Even though all this mobile approach looks interesting, there are many ways it can backfire if they do the wrong things. For example if they get too greedy with their services it will not work. If they turn their mobile environment into a "pay to win" they also run the risk of botching the whole operation. They would have to be quite sensible about the users because this is something they had never tried before so it can go bad if they give the wrong impression. This is especially true on this day and age, where the simplest of complaints spreads like wildfire through the net and can have devastating consequences for a product (ask Microsoft).

Relax Mario, you don't have to jump to mobile devices to be good.

Wrapping it up

Nintendo can definitely go mobile, but they have to do it in a way that adds up to what they already have without having to replace anything. What they have been doing in these past months have been great and there should be no reason to make any drastic decisions, so all they need to do is to keep on building up until they reach a point where they can convince the non-believers and become an industry powerhouse once again. If that is what their higher ups are thinking then the mobile environment is a great untapped place for them to continue their efforts.