What Nintendo's E3 2015 Digital Event Taught Us

[Steven Bogos]

What Nintendo's E3 2015 Digital Event Taught Us

Nintendo's E3 event had a lot of style, but fairly little substance.

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[Dark Knifer]

I agree with that conclusion, especially in regards to the metroid game. They should really know by now that first person shooters and the ds line don't go together. Metroid prime hunters is still the most painful game on my hands I've ever played.

But yeah, only thing I liked from this was starfox, everything else just just felt like yet more spinoffs and gimmicks.

 

[Alfredo Jones]

Nintendo's E3 showing feels like it's a holdover until 2016. They are saving all the big guns and ammo for next year and are going to use it to blow our minds. NX, their mobile partnership with DeNA, Zelda U, and god knows what else.

I'm also hoping those Amiibo cards pan out cause they could be a nice answer to the current shortages. Plus I would love to collect them all in a binder like I did with my old Pokemon cards.

Edit: Also like to add that despite all the bad reveals Nintendo still had the most "fun" presentation of the show. I was brought to tears laughing at all the puppet segments and seeing Miyamoto talk about making the original Star Fox and showing the diagrams from making Super Mario Bros was compelling.

 

[Micah Weil]

Dunno...I was quite happy with the substance.
The thought of the Animal Crossing Amiibos made me squeal quite happily.

The fact that Reggie has a puppet body, and it is ready still bothers me...

 

[Starik20X6]

What I learned from Nintendo's E3 this year was that they don't have to blow us out of the water with a whole slate of huge top-tier announcements to provide a good showing. The new StarFox looks great, and I'm a sucker for all things Animal Crossing. The multiplayer Zelda and Metroid titles look interesting, I'm keen to learn more about them. Mario Maker is going to be an absolute blast, and the Wooly World trailers just got me that much more excited for it's release later this month.

Dunno...I was quite happy with the substance.
The thought of the Animal Crossing Amiibos made me squeal quite happily.

The fact that Reggie has a puppet body, and it is ready still bothers me...

I was in stitches over that puppet opening. And that little Nintendo mind reading chip in my brain must have picked up on my desire for some Animal Crossing Amiibo... I must own them all!

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I get the impression that N, with the Wii U, is good at catering for their fandom, but awful at suckering in more customers.

 

[WeepingAngels]

Nintendo's E3 showing feels like it's a holdover until 2016. They are saving all the big guns and ammo for next year and are going to use it to blow our minds. NX, their mobile partnership with DeNA, Zelda U, and god knows what else.

I'm also hoping those Amiibo cards pan out cause they could be a nice answer to the current shortages. Plus I would love to collect them all in a binder like I did with my old Pokemon cards.

Zelda NX maybe. At the very least it will be cross platform like Twilight Princess was with the NX getting the timed exclusive.

 

[Hairless Mammoth]

Nintendo completely pulled the rug out from underneath Metroid fans. We've been been waiting 13 years for a sequel to Fusion,[footnote]To not go too far into details and spoilers: Samus and her AI CO have pretty much just made enemies with at least a small, but powerful group in the Federation.[/footnote] and 8 years since the last good Metroid. They responded with a co-op shooter and shooter-sports hybrid, set "in the Metroid universe" with chibi troopers. They've forgotten that the 3 main Primes are not even really shooters,[footnote]Nintendo even coined the First Person Adventure term to fit them.[/footnote] and also forgotten the rich 2D legacy of the series, while churning out 2D Mario remakes at a steady pace. The game might be good, but it's title is extremely misleading. If Big N has another (real) Metroid is secretly in development, it was a poor choice to not at least give a quick mention to it.

The Amiibo focus also hasn't changed, of course. You just know that those Animal Crossing Amiibos will be fairly uncommon, unless you look on ebay for a 300% markup. (Also, how about that Animal Crossing party/board game coming out, instead of a true entry fans wanted for the Wii U?) Using a rare Amiibo like Wiifit Trainer to show off a feature in Mario Maker was a low blow.

Maybe they should do more Muppet shows. That was just about the only completely new thing that didn't make me go "meh" or "kill it with fire." The exception being the multiplayer Zelda, which is giving me a fear that the online component will have the Splatoon style "no talking" rule.

Nintendo's E3 showing feels like it's a holdover until 2016. They are saving all the big guns and ammo for next year and are going to use it to blow our minds. NX, their mobile partnership with DeNA, Zelda U, and god knows what else.

It seems like they were holding back, but desperately tried to hide it. Hopefully, later Directs leading up to and including E3 2016 will make up for it.

I'm also hoping those Amiibo cards pan out cause they could be a nice answer to the current shortages. Plus I would love to collect them all in a binder like I did with my old Pokemon cards.

The cards were one of the things I was expecting this year, at least a release date or the launch lineup. The only thing new info we got were the Animal Crossing cards. What about the scores of characters that sold out within minutes and unlock loads of things across several games, Nintendo?

 

[Alfredo Jones]

Nintendo's E3 showing feels like it's a holdover until 2016. They are saving all the big guns and ammo for next year and are going to use it to blow our minds. NX, their mobile partnership with DeNA, Zelda U, and god knows what else.

I'm also hoping those Amiibo cards pan out cause they could be a nice answer to the current shortages. Plus I would love to collect them all in a binder like I did with my old Pokemon cards.

Zelda NX maybe. At the very least it will be cross platform like Twilight Princess was with the NX getting the timed exclusive.

Both Reggie and Iwata have stated the Zelda will come to the Wii U, sales figures be damned, so the Twilight Princess shtick will probably happen. I think it would depend on how much Zelda U relies on the Gamepad and if the NX will use a similar controller or opt for a more traditional one like the Pro Controller.

The cards were one of the things I was expecting this year, at least a release date or the launch lineup. The only thing new info we got were the Animal Crossing cards. What about the scores of characters that sold out within minutes and unlock loads of things across several games, Nintendo?

That is what I'm hoping most for from these cards. Apparently Nintendo says part of the problem with Amiibo is that labor strikes at ports along the west coast of the US have drove shipping prices up, making the shipping of larger items like Amiibo more expensive and thus much harder. They said smaller items like the actual games are still manageable, so perhaps these smaller Amiibo cards will be more readily available. If so Nintendo could release card versions of previous Amiibo (Smash, Super Mario, Splatoon) to make up for the scarcity of those lines.

 

[InsanityRequiem]

The fact that so many people seemed to believe that E3s are supposed to be absolutely fantastical and super hype inducing confuses the fuck out of me. It's as if the past E3s beyond a year ago don't exist anymore.

What did this year's E3 teach me? That people have horrible memory and that E3 is a horrible place to give any sort of press event, because each year will always be different.

Was this show better than last year's show? No. But it was what I expected. What did I expect from Nintendo this year? Small time game (new and old) showings and gameplay, actual gameplay, videos. Why? Because I knew that a company will not be able to maintain any sort of "fan hype". And sadly, this entire circus will repeat next year, with "fans" going positively/negatively crazy depending on what Nintendo shows.

Next year will be the same, some companies will do great, some will be middling, and some will bomb horribly. And everyone will lose their collective minds again, forgetting how the show went the year before, and it'll get annoying seeing/hearing/reading people go into extreme positive/negative mode.

 

[Hairless Mammoth]

That is what I'm hoping most for from these cards. Apparently Nintendo says part of the problem with Amiibo is that labor strikes at ports along the west coast of the US have drove shipping prices up, making the shipping of larger items like Amiibo more expensive and thus much harder. They said smaller items like the actual games are still manageable, so perhaps these smaller Amiibo cards will be more readily available. If so Nintendo could release card versions of previous Amiibo (Smash, Super Mario, Splatoon) to make up for the scarcity of those lines.

Yes, the strikes were a likely contribution to the Amiibo shortages. But, that problem was resolved months ago, and even the backlog of cargo from it has had more than enough time to be unloaded and distributed.

Recently released Amiibo are still selling out like mad, and many earlier Amiibo were rare in parts of the world that a US strike shouldn't have affected. Nintendo was stretching the truth with the strikes. They still won't make enough, and retailers won't order enough. I am worried they wish to let the demand drummed up by shortage keep their brands in the news and keep the revenue flowing from the figures they do sell, rather than satisfy the people, who only want the game functionality of Amiibo, with cheap cards.

I wouldn't mind paying $10-$20 for a handful of cards that unlock most of the stuff in their games, but I'm not interested in hunting down $13+ figures to do the same. I might be the kind of customer that Nintendo isn't interested in.

 

[Story]

I get the impression that N, with the Wii U, is good at catering for their fandom, but awful at suckering in more customers.

Funny you should say that because many of their fans are pretty angry at them at the moment. See the backlash from Metriod and Animal Crossing fans for more informations if you'd like. If anyone's fandom was catered this E3, it was Sony's. Edit: Or instead of looking farther into this, just read the comments above to see the amount of anger Nintendo fans have right now.

 

[vagabondwillsmile]

What I learned from Nintendo's E3 this year was that they don't have to blow us out of the water with a whole slate of huge top-tier announcements to provide a good showing. The new StarFox looks great, and I'm a sucker for all things Animal Crossing. The multiplayer Zelda and Metroid titles look interesting, I'm keen to learn more about them. Mario Maker is going to be an absolute blast, and the Wooly World trailers just got me that much more excited for it's release later this month.

Dunno...I was quite happy with the substance.
The thought of the Animal Crossing Amiibos made me squeal quite happily.

The fact that Reggie has a puppet body, and it is ready still bothers me...

I was in stitches over that puppet opening. And that little Nintendo mind reading chip in my brain must have picked up on my desire for some Animal Crossing Amiibo... I must own them all!

The puppets were just fantastic! And I want the Animal Crossing amiibos too. If scalpers don't buy them all first. I love Nintendo, But Amiibo is a travesty. Their show was by far the most fun and most entertaining though. I'm super excited for Xenoblade and Fire Emblem! Otherwise, I was dissappointed with the announcements.

 

[Airon]

For all interested in a more thorough analysis, which expands on the comments in the Nintendo briefing considerably, check out this Extra Credits video:

Design Club - Super Mario Bros: Level 1-1 - How Super Mario Mastered Level Design
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZH2wGpEZVgE

 

[Casual Shinji]

I get the impression that N, with the Wii U, is good at catering for their fandom, but awful at suckering in more customers.

Nintendo had Wii-U games at E3 this year? That's news to me! Oh what, that shitty looking Star Fox game? Yeah, that's obviously Nintendo just kidding around. I mean, come one...

 

[Strazdas]

What it taught me is that no matter how bad your press conference is, as long as your company's name is "Nintendo" you will have half the press rabidly defending you as if their life defended on it.

 

[Micah Weil]

Dunno...I was quite happy with the substance.
The thought of the Animal Crossing Amiibos made me squeal quite happily.

The fact that Reggie has a puppet body, and it is ready still bothers me...

I was in stitches over that puppet opening. And that little Nintendo mind reading chip in my brain must have picked up on my desire for some Animal Crossing Amiibo... I must own them all!

I'm hoping that there's more than the four that they showed.
A Mable amiibo without a Sable or Labelle? BLASPHEMY!

 

[BarkBarker]

It coulda been just fine if they hadn't shown the Metroid game or the Animal Crossing Wii U board game that only works with Amiibo. A very large amount of fans for those series wanted something interesting to be shown for those franchises and they got smacked in the chops with the Metroid Prime moniker and a cheap, lazy Animal Crossing board game. I still think the Federation Forces game could be good, however it shouldn't exist without a mainstay Metroid game being announced or released recently like they did with Metroid Pinball. Not a great game but you get your fix with the big dog anyway.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I get the impression that N, with the Wii U, is good at catering for their fandom, but awful at suckering in more customers.

Funny you should say that because many of their fans are pretty angry at them at the moment. See the backlash from Metriod and Animal Crossing fans for more informations if you'd like. If anyone's fandom was catered this E3, it was Sony's. Edit: Or instead of looking farther into this, just read the comments above to see the amount of anger Nintendo fans have right now.

Well, a lot of people are still starkly defending it, but yes, most seem to agree the conference was quite the non-event.