The future of Cave

[Skykid]

The Wii is dying because nearly everyone owns a Wii at this point

FTFY. With 90 million units shipped (according to a CES 2012 interview) and the next Nintendo console coming out "soon", it's no wonder that sales would be dropping off.

No, it's mainly because Nintendo's own software support for the past ~2+ years has been beyond terrible. Wii sales started to drop BEFORE Wii U was announced. There is virtually nothing coming out for the system. Add to this the vicious cycle of Wii being marketed to casual gamers which lead to an onslaught of casual crap and shovelware, with "core games" selling very badly, which is why most major devs started to ignore the console, which in turn made it uninteresting for non-casuals (=people who actually buy games).
Nintendo made a crapton of money this gen; if they had invested a tiny fraction of this to hire more developers and produce a decent supply of games, Wii would still be doing fine.

Asstalk.

Your postulations are exaggerated and your reasoning groundless. Barraketh's suggestion is obviously correct: market growth cannot be maintained at consistent levels once saturation has occurred. The Wii sold through its core userbase and then some, hence its in a prime position to be the first console to show signs of decreased sales revenue since its debut six year ago.

If you want to talk about whether or not Nintendo's strategy has run out of steam, we could examine the 3DS launch - although sales of the machine rocketed over the last couple of months with the release of Mario 3D and Mario Kart, two titles up to Nintendo's highest standards of quality.

As for the Vita, see those fortnight launch figures? Ouch.

And that PS3, what a shmupless piece of shit eh?

[Friendly]

Your postulations are exaggerated and your reasoning groundless. Barraketh's suggestion is obviously correct: market growth cannot be maintained at consistent levels once saturation has occurred.

(Why am I even replying to this ignorant drivel?) As is apparent, you have no clue as to the total video game market size. Hint: 90 Million is not the limit for a system in this day and age.
During the previous generation, a total of roughly 200 Million home consoles were sold. The global video game market has grown considerably since then.
Obviously the market is not saturated at this point, otherwise PS3/360 sales would start to decline instead of continuing to grow, and they haven't even reached the "magic" 200 USD price point.
Secondly, fail to understand the razor and blade model, which also applies to video game systems.
Last but not least, you don't understand pricing either, the main reason (aside from lack of games) why 3DS failed to take off at first and then suddenly started selling like hot cakes.
Maybe you should have studied a semester or two of economics before sullying this forum with your blabber which all but demonstrates your lack of knowledge/brains?

Yes, I know, I should not argue with stupid people. They drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.

[Barrakketh]

If you want to talk about whether or not Nintendo's strategy has run out of steam, we could examine the 3DS launch - although sales of the machine rocketed over the last couple of months with the release of Mario 3D and Mario Kart, two titles up to Nintendo's highest standards of quality.

Plus a large price drop. They made a mistake of charging too much for the 3DS based on the reaction from what we saw from the various industry shows. The price was cut, we saw two Mario games released and Monster Hunter Tri G. At its release it was relatively expensive and didn't have much in the way of games.

And in a classy move, Iwata took a 50% pay cut voluntarily after they slashed its price. Representative directors and normal directors took 30 and 20 percent pay cuts, respectively. It's nice to see executives that don't have blinders on and take responsibility for their fuckups (like the 3DS launch).

As for the Vita, see those fortnight launch figures? Ouch.

Especially when you see it doing worse than the PSP. I don't know how the Japanese view its pricing, but a large gaming forum I frequent the Vita went from "Nice hardware at a price competitive with the 3DS" to "$80 more expensive than a 3DS and you have to buy an overpriced proprietary memory card" which really watered down the enthusiasm for those that weren't already set on buying one.

(Why am I even replying to this ignorant drivel?) As is apparent, you have no clue as to the total market size. Hint: 90 Million is not the limit.
During the previous generation, a total of roughly 200 Million home consoles were sold.

See, you mention "home consoles". The problem is, homes can (and do) have multiple consoles. That doesn't mean that there is potentially 200 million unique consumers who would each buy a given console.

Yes, the market has grown. You should also note that if you aligned the PS2's sales (best selling home console last generation) with that the Wii's sales that the Wii has sold consoles faster than the monster that was the PS2.

Obviously the market is not saturated at this point, otherwise PS3/360 sales would not continue to grow (but they do), and they haven't even reached the "magic" 200 USD price point.

The market for the Wii console is saturated. The PS3 and 360 were held back by their price (the PS3 in particular had 599 US DOLLARS on their side at launch), talk of hardware issues (RROD), and general lack of casual games. The 360 recently got a boost from Kinect, and you'll note that Sony did their own take on the Wii remote and nunchuck with Move.

That said, you should note that the 360's and PS3's sales were down 8 and 22 percent (respectively) year-over-year. The Wii's had the largest drop because just about everyone and their grandmother has one (note: that is a figure of speech).

Secondly, fail to understand the razor and blade model, which also applies to video game systems.

You'll note that home consoles don't really fit that because the "razor" is a lot more expensive than the blades, and that not all companies choose to sell their systems for a loss. Nintendo in particular opts to make a profit on their hardware since they don't have other divisions to keep the company afloat.

Yes, I know, I should not argue with stupid people. They drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.

Nice ad hominem.

[Friendly]

Nintendo in particular opts to make a profit on their hardware since they don't have other divisions to keep the company afloat.

That is not entirely correct. During part of its run, Nintendo sold Gamecube at a loss. Ninetndo is currently selling 3DS at a loss.

Yes, the market has grown. You should also note that if you aligned the PS2's sales (best selling home console last generation) with that the Wii's sales that the Wii has sold consoles faster than the monster that was the PS2.

Yes, and 160 Million PS2s were sold, last generation. Hence my assessment that 90 Million is not the limit now.

[Skykid]

Maybe you should have studied a semester of two of economics before sullying this forum with your blabber which all but demonstrates your lack of knowledge/brains?

Yes, I know, I should not argue with stupid people. They drag you down to their level and then beat you with experience.

Perhaps you should have done a semester in basic grammatical sentence structure, unless you're just suggesting I, as the purported 'stupid person', just beat you with experience? In which case you'd be spot on, bravo.

Last generation hit saturation at approx 200 million sales across the PS2 (155 mil) Gamecube (25 mil) and Xbox (25 mil).
Compared that to the today's cumulative sales of current gen, now peaking at 210 million across three different consoles...
I suppose Nintendo better dig their heels in and start driving more sales, the lazy fuckers, there's obviously a hidden third-world demographic left to exploit.

Market share is divisible by demographic. PS3 and 360 cater to a largely different set of gamers to the casual market Nintendo created, but even that market is now being eaten into by Kinect and PS3 Move and the formers push into social gaming. As such, saturation has occurred in Nintendo's "core market", as I mentioned before - not the market as a whole, forcing sales of the console to decrease naturally.

If you did a semester in economics, why are you ignoring factors of target audience? Or do you want Nintendo to do an about face turn and go all hardcore?

[Friendly]

Perhaps you should have done a semester in basic grammatical sentence structure,

You fail yet again, this time at pointing out flaws. Take a close look at your keyboard. Then note how "R" and "F" are next to each other. The resulting mistake is called a typo, and is unrelated to grammar. Good night!

PS.
Nintendo's strategy was called "blue ocean", look it up. And it only worked for a limited time because they could not sustain it (all on their own).

[Skykid]

Perhaps you should have done a semester in basic grammatical sentence structure,

You fail yet again, this time at pointing out flaws. Take a close look at your keyboard. Then note how "R" and "F" are next to each other. The resulting mistake is called a typo, and is unrelated to grammar. Good night!

Don't worry, you're allowed to suck at typing here as long as you keep making yourself look bad.

So are you just going to run off with your tail between your legs and ignore the response to your argument? I see Barraketh and I made almost identical points regarding saturation by demographic target audience, so you could at least do us the courtesy of either replying, or conceding that as an economics student you're a total loser.

[NzzpNzzp]

I like how you guys still manage to have console wars on a forum which only likes arcade games. Kinda impressive.

[Friendly]

@Skykid

I already replied, you just failed to understand it. I gave you several hints, but it seems you need things spelled out for you.
The main goal of companies who create game systems is not to sell hardware, but sell software and earn money with licensing fees, as that's where the profits are.
This generation, Nintendo tried to use a blue ocean strategy. They went after casual gamers, though they also tried to please their pre-existing customer base. They successfully created a new market, but then did not manage to sustain it, and they certainly did not manage to saturate both the new market and the pre-existing one. A customer base consisting of largely casual gamers has a low software attach rate. Hence their new strategy turned out to be unprofitable for third party developers, who in turn stopped supporting Wii with larger game projects. Nintendo on its own was unable or unwilling to maintain a continuous supply of high profile releases. This, combined with the abscence of major third party games displeased many core gamers and caused them to migrate to PS3 and 360. This is why Wii hardware and software sales started to decline steeply and prematurely a year ago (=two years before the launch their next sytem), unlike last generation's PS2.

The end.

[Siren2011]

I like how you guys still manage to have console wars on a forum which only likes arcade games. Kinda impressive.

Uh...Okay? Last time I checked, there wasn't a big neon sign on the forum that said "ArCaDe GeAmZ OnLy, PlZ. ConSOLE $ux." If you've been paying any attention whatsoever in the past year or so you've been here, you'd know that people are constantly posting in the "Awesome Stuff You Just Bought" thread (among others...) with pictures of Super Famicom games and CAVE ports. Do some people here have a preference for arcade games? Sure. But does everyone here hate consoles? Hardly any. In fact I would go so far as to say whoever doesn't venture past playing arcade games exclusively is closed minded. The same of course goes for people who only play console games. Personally, I prefer to be well rounded in everything that catches my interest in life. And I'm sure I speak for most people in the forum in saying that, too. Compare your average poster here to a generic GameFAQs user or Destructoid reader. The difference in intelligence, wit, and enthusiasm is vast.

[AntiFritz]

I like how this is all relevant to the future of cave.

[Friendly]

I like how you guys still manage to have console wars on a forum which only likes arcade games. Kinda impressive.

This is not a console war. Quite the opposite: My initial post called out a fanboy who doesn't see the beam in his own eye.

And as Siren2011 said, we aren't limited to arcade games here. A good game is a good game, no matter the platform.

And now, back on topic.

[TheSoundofRed]

I like how this is all relevant to the future of cave.

You summed it up perfectly. Thank you.

[Siren2011]

I like how this is all relevant to the future of cave.

http://www.foxsportsflorida.com/01/13/1 ... eedID=3682

"I can relate to him a lot," said James, who like Tebow, is one of the most talked-about athletes anywhere. "I see how the media plays it sometimes and how the critics go at him and to see him continue to prove them wrong. If it's a good game or a bad game on his part, he continues to stay positive and move forward. And that's a great sign. It's a great leader. You respect that no matter if you're in that same sport or not."

http://thefourohfive.com/news/article/a ... er-account

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/09/ ... RY20110914

Nicolas Cage awoken by naked man with Fudgesicle

[Friendly]

The Wii talk at least was relevant, because it needed to be explained why Wii is not a viable option for Cave.

[Casper<3]

I like how this is all relevant to the future of cave.

I like your avatar. Heres to hoping Seseri is back in Galuda 3

[AntiFritz]

I like how this is all relevant to the future of cave.

I like your avatar. Heres to hoping Seseri is back in Galuda 3

Let's just hope theirs enough of a future for cave to make a galuda 3.

[Casper<3]

So as far as the future of CAVE, I would really like to see....

ESPGARUDA 3 (and 360 port)
Deathsmiles "Iphone" content as 360 DLC
Mushihimesama 3 as well as a port of Matsuri 1.5 on 360
Dodonpachi (/campaign) with upgraded sprites from DFK 360 port

I like Ibara but could care less if it or any of the older games ever get ported. Maybe a compilation disc with Galuda 1, Ibara (BL), Progear, and Dangun. Not going to happen but would be nice.

If Instant Brain made it over here, I would buy it.

[Skykid]

The main goal of companies who create game systems is not to sell hardware, but sell software and earn money with licensing fees, as that's where the profits are.

Although Nintendo have always had a practice of selling hardware for profit, Wii included. Different subject altogether though, unsure why you're bringing it up. It's not like Nintendo have no cash in the bank.

This generation, Nintendo tried to use a blue ocean strategy. They went after casual gamers, though they also tried to please their pre-existing customer base. They successfully created a new market, but then did not manage to sustain it, and they certainly did not manage to saturate both the new market and the pre-existing one.

We already know that. We're talking about market saturation in total terms, across different gaming demographics. The decline of Nintendo's casual market is also due to the emergence of competing enterprises, such as Kinect etc.

A customer base consisting of largely casual gamers has a low software attach rate. Hence their new strategy turned out to be unprofitable for third party developers, who in turn stopped supporting Wii with larger game projects.

Sorry to burst the myth bubble for you.Here's some information on attach rates showing the 360 lagging behind the Wii, unsurprising considering the 360's Japanese performance.

Nintendo on its own was unable or unwilling to maintain a continuous supply of high profile releases. This, combined with the abscence of major third party games displeased many core gamers and caused them to migrate to PS3 and 360. This is why Wii hardware and software sales started to decline steeply and prematurely a year ago (=two years before the launch their next sytem), unlike last generation's PS2.

It's boring when you make things up. Last generation's PS2 had relatively no competition. It owned 75% of the market, there was nowhere else for it to go except up. Compare that to a much stronger competitive generation and it's obvious that Nintendo's first party software is not the primary reason for a decline in sales, but that 90 million literally is the shape of the demographic that they appeal to.

Food for thought:
"Nintendo reported that on Black Friday 2011 over 500,000 Wii consoles were sold making it the biggest Black Friday for the company."

My initial post called out a fanboy who doesn't see the beam in his own eye.

Fanboy, ha ha. That does give me a chuckle.

You're not to know though, ain't your fault.

[Barrakketh]

Nintendo in particular opts to make a profit on their hardware since they don't have other divisions to keep the company afloat.

That is not entirely correct. During part of its run, Nintendo sold Gamecube at a loss. Ninetndo is currently selling 3DS at a loss.

They also took a short-term loss with the 3DS price drop. Sometimes taking a loss in the present is a better option than letting sales stagnate and losing even more money in the future.

That's completely different than Microsoft rushing the 360 to make it to market first, selling the console at a loss, then losing even more money because of the crappy cooling design that led to the RROD and subsequent repairs/exchanges.

Yes, the market has grown. You should also note that if you aligned the PS2's sales (best selling home console last generation) with that the Wii's sales that the Wii has sold consoles faster than the monster that was the PS2.

Yes, and 160 Million PS2s were sold, last generation. Hence my assessment that 90 Million is not the limit now.[/quote]
The PS2 continued selling decently for years after the current generation of consoles hit the market. In December 2008 the PS2 hit 50 million units in North America, 8 years after launch. That was well after the current generation consoles hit the market. In September of 2011 the Wii hit 42.44 million units in NA after five years on the market. Your claim that the PS2 sold 160 million units "last generation" is silly because you're counting PS2's sold this generation. Hell, the PlayStation managed to sell 100 million units over the course of 9 1/2 years.

There are three kinds of lies; lies, damned lies, and statistics. Context matters, and including sales of a console that has been on the market for 11 years and using that as a comparison for a console that has been on the market for five (and had part of its lifespan during a recession) is silly considering the point you're trying to make.

The PS2 also had issues with faulty disc drives that necessitated repairs/replacement (I found it cheaper to replace the PS2 than to let Sony fix mine, and I had two of them that eventually got disc read errors).

Nintendo on its own was unable or unwilling to maintain a continuous supply of high profile releases. This, combined with the abscence of major third party games displeased many core gamers and caused them to migrate to PS3 and 360.

They didn't migrate. Nintendo didn't try hard to appeal to so-called "core gamers" with the Wii, though they did continue produce those games that appealed to fans of Nintendo franchises. Despite their flaws and that I do think they need a change in direction with some of their franchises (but not in the direction that Other M took...), I could (at least in theory) buy a Nintendo console for Nintendo's franchises that are going to be exclusive to that platform.

The games available on the Wii and the 360/PS3 are different, and odds are you're either a) a casual gamer that might own a single console, or b) you're a "core gamer" that is going to own multiple consoles. For multiplayer games (especially FPSes) odds are you're going to get it for the 360 because Live is much better than PSN and you're going to have more friends on the 360, and they will also be playing it on the 360. The less said about Nintendo's online support for multiplayer on the Wii the better.

I like how this is all relevant to the future of cave.

Cave doomed, to be bought by Nintendo to increase the company's reserve of DOOOOOOOOOOOM. Because Nintendo is always doomed, you see.

[NzzpNzzp]

In fact I would go so far as to say whoever doesn't venture past playing arcade games exclusively is closed minded.

The overall opinion of the forum would go so far as to say they're still playing 24 out of 25 of the best shmups ever, though.

[AntiFritz]

I like how this is all relevant to the future of cave.

Cave doomed, to be bought by Nintendo to increase the company's reserve of DOOOOOOOOOOOM. Because Nintendo is always doomed, you see.

New ceo - Evacaneer Doom

[Friendly]

It's boring when you make things up. [...] that 90 million literally is the shape of the demographic that they appeal to.

It's boring when you make things up. And funny when you contradict yourself in the very next sentence:

Food for thought:
"Nintendo reported that on Black Friday 2011 over 500,000 Wii consoles were sold making it the biggest Black Friday for the company."

So according to the information you excavated from your ass 90 Million is Nintendo's entire target group, whose demand is already satisfied. Yet they managed to sell an additional 500,000 units to people in the US on black Friday, who by your logic are not part of Nintendo's target group. Or what are you trying to tell us here? Anyway, Nintendo sold fewer home consoles than either of the competitors in 2011, despite Wii being the cheapest console after several price drops. Fact.

Attach rates (from madeupchartz, take it with a grain of salt):

Global Software Totals, Week Ending 31st Dec 2011

X360 6,535,142
PS3 5,755,105
Wii 5,414,583

Oh no, Wii's combined software sales are not the highest, despite there being only half as many PS360s. They are actually the lowest. How can this be? Did the consumers not ask Skykid what to buy before they went shopping?

PS.
Why are we talking about this? You wrote that PS3 is a "bloody multimedia blu-ray player" that "no-one wants to develop for", which makes you a fanboy, which I pointed out. You then continued to demonstrate ignorance on several other topics, including but not limted to: Economics, pricing, marketing strategies, sales, attach rates, video game market dynamics, video game sales numbers, market segmentation, target groups and size of target groups, product life cycles.

[Skykid]

PS.
Why are we talking about this? You wrote that PS3 is a "bloody multimedia blu-ray player" that "no-one wants to develop for", which makes you a fanboy, which I pointed out. You then continued to demonstrate ignorance on several other topics, including but not limted to: Economics, pricing, marketing strategies, sales, attach rates, video game market dynamics, video game sales numbers, market segmentation, target groups and size of target groups.

Well, that was enjoyable for a while. I don't think you've managed to convince a single person regarding the value of your original statement, but you're clearly a qualified videogame market analyst with a strong grasp of the figures.

In answer to your question, I just thought I'd enjoy giving you some shit for a while. I felt you deserved it for referring to me in the third-person for an entire page of comments, which is pretty fucking rude. You can always address me directly, I'll never shy away from a question or debate.

If you really need clarification on the response to Last_Dancer (I don't know why you do, it's pretty clear) it's because he's contributed 22 posts that essentially say the same thing. If you're looking for annoying fanboyism, there you go. The response was intended to be vitriolic so he'd get the picture, hence the Blu-Ray quip. You mis-interpreted the "no-one", since the meaning was related to shmup devs only (I'm pretty sure you can grasp that no-one developing for the PS3 period is an impossibility.)

I'm an arcade gamer first and foremost. Both my 360 and PS3 can suck shit for all I care. Due to terms of employment I've spent years playing bucket loads of garbage on them, and they're now collecting a nice film of current-gen dust under my TV.

[Estebang]

Let's be done with the console war nonsense already, folks. This isn't GameFAQs.

What do we care more about: the PS3 or Cave?

[Friendly]

@Skykid
Sorry for insulting you. Seems you pushed the right buttons.

[Skykid]

@Skykid
Sorry for insulting you. Seems you pushed the right buttons.

It's cool, gave me something to do on this yawnsome forum. Have a good weekend.

[rancor]

wow.. that was an interesting wrap up.
If only we could all get along so well after a heated argument.

[Jonathan Ingram]

I'll wait until the Wii is dirt cheap, and then I'll finally play Muramasa (if an XBLA release doesn't happen first), Fragile Dreams, & Sin & Punishment.

Muramasa runs great in Dolphin even on old PC rigs(not sure about Fragile Dreams and S&P though).

[GMRmarc]

I would argue that Cave going mobile has something to do with this http://www.ebay.com/ctg/Pink-Sweets-and ... 286.c0.m14

In all honesty no one is going to pay full retail for these types of games. However, on a positive note, I among many (likely?) discovered Cave games via iOS. So maybe there will be a rebounding effect. If they find success on the iOS marketplace, a direct competitor to XBOX LIVE, perhaps the folks at Microsoft will wake up and allow Cave to port whatever they want via XBLA.