We don't really know about their positioning approach yet. What about Kinect Next? What about all those online services? I think they are targetting a broader audience now.
Nintendo ditches main E3 conference, still there with games, press events, N-Direct
- Thread starter Hobby
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We don't really know about their positioning approach yet. What about Kinect Next? What about all those online services? I think they are targetting a broader audience now.
Osiris
I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
Every company under the sun "provides things for journalists" at E3, it's kind of a large part of the point of the whole event.
None of that compares to the mainstream press reaction to things from the main keynote conferences, not even close.
Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
So where did you read this press event journalists will be invited to attend will be nothing worthwhile which means every journalist will skip it/not report it?
And if it's got nothing worthwhile how the hell would calling it a conference and live streaming it to us help anything?
And of course "every company under the sun" is like Nintendo providing all their big IP for first viewing and playing, obviously. Totally.
Make sense, please.
ThoughtsOfSpeaking
Banned
this information is slightly misleading as E3 conferences tend to be show on multiples sites media players and have accompanying live streams/ writeups on all tech sites, gaming related or not. Not to mention coverage in the print media.
NDs tend to only be on youtube, with anything of note written up afterwards. You rarely have them covered in the mainstream print press.
Video views are only a small part of the story.
what media? what would they write about, nintendo is only goingto show big games. MS and sony havea console to actually show. There is no comparison. They will have their section showing new mario kart etc no matter what.
Phoenician_Viking
Banned
2011 WiiU reveal underwhelmed. MS and Sony´s conf were better.
2012 WiiU re-reveal really really sucked dog shit. MS and Sony´s conf were better.
So your statement is false.
Bingo. The story in the mainstream media will be Nintendo not having a conference.
Mihael Mello Keehl
Banned
Then who is competing with sony? Only Nintendo and their outdated console?
Sho_Nuff82
Member
E3 isn't really all that relevant to having good Christmas sales though. More specifically, a good E3 conference is completely irrelevant compared to having great games all over the show floor. MS has showed this repeatedly over the past few years.
It's more important for Nintendo to get great WoM for upcoming titles (this is how Wii Sports, Kinect, and Minecraft got so big), rather than have gushing previews of demo reels and megaton announcements that are only big insofar as they surprise the small message board communities.
I love how people are acting as if they abandoned E3. Having small conferences about the games and demos is more than enough to get media coverage, it's not like only the big conferences get covered. In fact they've been serving more and more as system wars fuel than anything else.
Nintendo has been moving towards this for years, they downplay the main conference and have smaller conferences and Q&As later as well as info released through other means and these things were always covered. The mass market doesn't really care either way, the enthusiasts will know everything as usual and the media will cover everything as usual. The only thing that changes is that Nintendo is doing its own thing, something for which they're known for.
Nintendo has been moving towards this for years, they downplay the main conference and have smaller conferences and Q&As later as well as info released through other means and these things were always covered. The mass market doesn't really care either way, the enthusiasts will know everything as usual and the media will cover everything as usual. The only thing that changes is that Nintendo is doing its own thing, something for which they're known for.
Osiris
I permanently banned my 6 year old daughter from using the PS4 for mistakenly sending grief reports as it's too hard to watch or talk to her
Press events happen all the time at E3, but they are just not as big a story as the "big show" events are, to argue otherwise is ridiculous, the E3 press conferences are the event for many of the mainstream press, period.
Sola Scriptura
Member
It appears Adam Sessler is prepared to rant about it in an impromptu "Sessler's Something" today.
https://twitter.com/AdamSessler/status/327269012306276354
https://twitter.com/AdamSessler/status/327269012306276354
Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Right, they will get this invitation to attend their exclusive Nintendo event and just go huh, must be fake, I read on NeoGAF they're not having a conference and press events are bound to have nothing, let's lunch break.
And if they do attend and they do see good shit, they will just go eh, it wasn't live streamed with fanfare, nerds just watched a Direct instead of what we saw, why bother telling anyone about it, let's not.
And if they do attend but there's no good shit to see, obviously showing it in a live conference would be so much better and get such great exposure in every news channel and newspaper.
Nintendoomed!!
Clearly you guys are trolling, good job.
BlazingDarkness
Member
You gave up years ago.
Zen_Arcade
Banned
How would you know that? No one has done something like this at E3. How do you know that holding a specific meeting focused on educating the press about Nintendo products wont be more direct and informative then a usual conference where all the information the press wants is buried in between charts and Usher performances?
I'm not saying this is a guaranteed good idea. But neither of us have any idea if this is going to be a better format then a usual E3 conference. It sure sounds better then the past couple E3s. Instead of having one big conference they're going to split off the information and hold smaller meetings that get the right information to the right people.
Hero of Legend
Member
I hope they make it a big E3 Direct then and have it know long enough prior so Nintendo World Store will do a live reaction to it, those are GREAT to watch on YouTube! 
Would've been great if there were live reactions to every big Direct, but sadly I guess they're too sudden or not eventful enough for them.
Reading GAF's great and all, but hearing people's shock, laughs, and cheers is so rewarding!
HEY, maybe GAF should commission live reactions via Skype or something, like a live chat while the Directs go down, should be no trouble to prepare as it's where ever you are unless you're in a public area, but you can be quiet and just comment either way. XD
Would've been great if there were live reactions to every big Direct, but sadly I guess they're too sudden or not eventful enough for them.
Reading GAF's great and all, but hearing people's shock, laughs, and cheers is so rewarding!
HEY, maybe GAF should commission live reactions via Skype or something, like a live chat while the Directs go down, should be no trouble to prepare as it's where ever you are unless you're in a public area, but you can be quiet and just comment either way. XD
Dave Meltzer
Banned
On Nintendo? I didn't give up till this year honestly.
Phoenician_Viking
Banned
No it´s very dumb. It shows that Nintendo can´t compete with Sony and MS´s new hardware and software. Nintendo needs to show that they can compete even though the WiiU is severely outmatched in the hardware department. This only shows that Nintendo is afraid to even show up against the competition.
Officerrob
Banned
In reality, Sony and Microsoft are competing with each other, but Microsoft wants to think they are competing with Apple
Holy cow, this is shocking.
They're rolling over and dying, sure, the other 2 are going to be showing off a new console but how can you just bow out and let them steal the show completely? What a pathetic display on their part, they're really putting out a terrible image.
Selfish me: I want this to be the beginning of Nintendo 3rd party, tho.
They're rolling over and dying, sure, the other 2 are going to be showing off a new console but how can you just bow out and let them steal the show completely? What a pathetic display on their part, they're really putting out a terrible image.
Selfish me: I want this to be the beginning of Nintendo 3rd party, tho.
Indeed. MS and Sony went up against Nintendo who had a new console to show 2 years in a row (and some suggest they even 'won' whatever that really means) and those are OLD consoles.
Nintendo have a console not even a year old they don't believe can compete with MS/Sony.
Mihael Mello Keehl
Banned
What? Im confused forget it
Wild and crazy theory that just struck me: Nintendo now consider Europe a more lucrative battlefield than America, and are going to have a notable presence at gamescom.
The increasing power of NoE relative to NoA made me think that Nintendo are taking more notice of Europe in recent years than they ever did in the past, and this might be a reflection of that.
I have to highlight that it's just a theory, but I can see merit to it.
The increasing power of NoE relative to NoA made me think that Nintendo are taking more notice of Europe in recent years than they ever did in the past, and this might be a reflection of that.
I have to highlight that it's just a theory, but I can see merit to it.
HawthorneKitty
Sgt. 2nd Class in the Creep Battalion, Waifu Wars
Guys, we should like run Nintendo because we like know their motives and like everything like.
MehsterChief
Member
That's bitter...
If Nintendo wants to turn people's perceptions of the Wii U around, they are doing it completely wrong.
In the state they are in, they have to go out on stage, big balls style, showing the world that they are still there and have great games. They need to invite the mainstream press, they need to have third party developers on stage, everything.
Instead, they'll probably only be showing some (admittedly, cool) first party titles, probably a few surprises that will please the hardcore audience.
But in order to make an impact they would have to do it live, overwhelm journalists. That is not going to happen.
In the last years, people complained about Nintendo's lackluster E3 conferences. This is their way of reacting: retreating.
Too bad....
If Nintendo wants to turn people's perceptions of the Wii U around, they are doing it completely wrong.
In the state they are in, they have to go out on stage, big balls style, showing the world that they are still there and have great games. They need to invite the mainstream press, they need to have third party developers on stage, everything.
Instead, they'll probably only be showing some (admittedly, cool) first party titles, probably a few surprises that will please the hardcore audience.
But in order to make an impact they would have to do it live, overwhelm journalists. That is not going to happen.
In the last years, people complained about Nintendo's lackluster E3 conferences. This is their way of reacting: retreating.
Too bad....
Europe's economic situation makes this theory highly unlikely.
There's basically nothing supporting your theory, I fear. The European market is faring quite badly for Nintendo at the moment and at the high times of Wii and DS they abandoned their Gamescom conference.
Tell me how canceling events is going to sell more console and software and I won't say anything more about your post.
Bony Manifesto
Member
I don't think Nintendo are a huge fan of Gamescom either, considering they boycotted it last year. That was a truly baffling move, considering they were only months away from launching the Wii U.
It was a joke. :/
shinra-bansho
Member
Are genres that Activision ran into the ground supposed to indicate the decline in relevance of E3?
It will be interesting how they go about it in terms of logistics and exclusivity.
Who do they invite to the press events?
How do they schedule it around the major publisher events?
Yeah, that's going to happen. Sure.
APZonerunner
Member
It really depends on how Nintendo plays it. Nintendo announced Wii U pricing details in a direct and that made the mainstream news because Nintendo PR worked to underline that fact and push it into the mainstream's lap. The difference is at E3 they're there already, so all Nintendo has to do is put on a show. If they're not going to take advantage of that existing audience, PR will have to work, and hard, for those column inches. That is, however, their job. Nintendo obviously weighed up the pros of having a bunch of press already in one place as a captive audience against the cons of being caught in the MS/Sony crossfire... and decided one outweighed the other. In my eyes this is still a better move for them than getting buried by the next-gen poo flinging.
As far as the press event at E3 stuff goes, it really depends on the size/scale of the event. If Nintendo hire a press conference hall size venue and do a 'hands on night' where they just say "here's the games, enjoy!" you'll likely see as much coverage as you would of a conference. Microsoft's Kinect "reveal" with the space ponchos wasn't streamed, and all invites were clear that this was to be a private event - no live blogging, no tweeting, no photos etcetera (I remember security threatening me for taking photos!) but it still gathered interest because of the way it was 'marketed' prior to happening.
I think people massively overblow how much actual mainstream press coverage E3 press conferences get. That one year when Nintendo got the front of USA Today was a big bloody deal. You're not seeing Fox Anchors filing reports from outside LA Live like you would with an Apple event. The 3DS XL was announced in a Direct and the next day was in newspapers, etcetera etcetera. If the news is big enough and if PR push hard enough it'll make it.
Nintendo has in the past few years repeatedly acted in a manner which suggests a vote of no confidence in the united front of making E3 news-central (remember last year, how they announced nothing and then 3 years later dropped a new console revision and several new games in a Direct?!) and this is just a natural continuation of that narrative.
MDSVeritas
Member
I just don't see how a series of Nintendo Directs and Press Briefings is necessarily making them more screwed. It certainly can make them more screwed, but I don't think a lack of a stage conference is necessarily going to diminish their presence. It's a case where I think either way it may be best until Nintendo begins to actually detail their exact presentation schedule for E3 before jumping to either conclusion, and even then we'll have to see what they present and how it's received.
ShockingAlberto
Member
I wake up to find everyone has suddenly become an expert in mainstream journalism, as if they're this alien thing we can only view through a cage so everyone has the same understanding of how they work based on observation.
Though on GAF, that is the assumption with mainstream anything. The strong, unbreakable belief that they're mentally retarded and can't understand the video game industry like people here can. They can only be told where to look by intense marketing and will ignore anything that doesn't fit the way it traditionally works.
If this ends up being a terrible idea, it's not going to be because USA Today couldn't figure out how to get the information because it wasn't at a stage show. It'd also be great if everyone who has never actually worked at a newspaper or other form of mainstream media would stop acting like we're all idiots who couldn't find our asses with both hands.
Though on GAF, that is the assumption with mainstream anything. The strong, unbreakable belief that they're mentally retarded and can't understand the video game industry like people here can. They can only be told where to look by intense marketing and will ignore anything that doesn't fit the way it traditionally works.
If this ends up being a terrible idea, it's not going to be because USA Today couldn't figure out how to get the information because it wasn't at a stage show. It'd also be great if everyone who has never actually worked at a newspaper or other form of mainstream media would stop acting like we're all idiots who couldn't find our asses with both hands.
Dave Meltzer
Banned
The mainstream press already doesn't give a crap about Nintendo. That's why Nintendo Directs exist. Nintendo wants to kill the traditional press because the people writing about games don't care about their systems. Everything Nintendi is doing is an attempt to marginalise people who offer any kind of critique of them. They want to just speak directly to customers and brainwash them.
oh come on now. Really?
Alexios
Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Um, what professional objective critique is there when you're watching a live stream of an E3 conference? Any critique comes after the fact obviously, and it can come after the fact with an exclusive press event we don't get to watch (though obviously the Direct(s) will have similar information) just as well. Plus they will obviously comment on the Direct as well after all is said and done if the differences warrant that kind of distinction.
Kabuki Waq
Member
Awful news for us but hey maybe it will work for Nintendo.
I personally think this will backfire badly though.
I personally think this will backfire badly though.
lwilliams3
Member
I believe you are putting more weight on Nintendo making this decision based on their competition than it probably is. With N-directs, they have more flexibility on when and how their games our shown, is cheaper, is has already been proven to be effective. Perhaps Nintendo could even get stations like Spike to air their Major N-directs to reach an even bigger audience.
Dave Meltzer
Banned
People go to game sites to watch those streams. Nintendo wants to kill those sites because they're not interested in under powered consoles with nothing but Nintendo games.
Thank you.
They're not though are they, it'd be announced with this.
I put it down to a cost saving measure + competition + the state of their business. If they really wanted to stick two fingers up to the mass media (they don't) they would have a big conference and tailor it to Nintendo fans and nobody else.
Conference would be over by the time it finished downloading.
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2. When Beatles: Rock Band came out, that genre was still pretty alive. It came out in 2009.
3. Tony Hawk didn't have a genre already damaged looking at how other peripheral based titles were doing and that it was the first skateboarding title with such a peripheral.
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