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[Lionel Richie]

Nintendo absolutely are not the good guys, they do plenty of stupid shit and aren't great with the consumers to say the least. The difference is they are still somewhat aware of how far they can go before shit goes topsy turvy. They won't risk the business. Sony and Microsoft, on the other hand, lost track of where the line is and went a mile over it hugging a ticking bomb.

 

[Generic]

Nintendo is the one that started $80 games.

 

[Emmy Ator Best]

Nintendo absolutely are not the good guys, they do plenty of stupid shit

Such as?

 

[Generic]

Such as?

$80 for a game with 15 yo graphics.

 

[Zannegan]

Companies are neither good nor bad. Nintendo's legal division is still a sack of shit and their upper management is still too weak to push back against their aging Japanese investors who are still stuck in the 1960s on how to run things.

They've always done this but it got really bad when Tropical Haze (creators of Yuzu and Citra) were caught red handed getting ROMs illegally weeks early and pirating those ROMs on their discord, really setting back emulation for profit.

Well hang on. You make some good points here, but the Japanese investors with their risk aversion and long view are one of the few reasons Nintendo (and Japanese gaming in general) is doing as well as it is, IMO. Japan's whole corporate sphere does seem slow to adapt, but that also makes it less reactionary and prone to make unforced errors out of fear (ie - panic selling, trend chasing, the studio buying war that's currently haunting MS and Sony).

 

[Plague Doctor]

Yeah this isn't blowing over yet for Sony. The press is knives out it seems. Which is weird cause usually when MS does their monthly fuck up, the press goes back to them.

Are we in a new era? Maybe good will has finally run out for team blue.

 

[Generic]

Well hang on. You make some good points here, but the Japanese investors with their risk aversion and long view are one of the few reasons Nintendo is doing as well as it is, IMO. The whole Japanese corporate sphere is slow to adapt, but that also makes it less reactionary and prone to make unforced errors out of panic (ie - panic selling, trend chasing, the studio buying war that's currently haunting MS and Sony).

Risk aversion and trend chasing are the same thing.

Nintendo made an open-world Zelda game, then an open-world Mario Kart and an open-world Metroid.

 

[sloppyjoe_gamer]

I wouldn't say they are the "good guys", but they are the less of 3 evils. Out of them all right now, they are in the best position IMO

 

[Radical_3d]

Nintendo are the good guys and Polygon is right…

 

[Syphon Filter]

Key cards are bad too because if you want to own that game for yourself then you cant since its the same as a digital license. Nintendo is next to go full digital but it wont be just yet, a few more years.

 

[Zannegan]

Risk aversion and trend chasing are the same thing.

Nintendo made an open-world Zelda game, then an open-world Mario Kart and an open-world Metroid.

You're talking development where we were discussing investors, and even then you're oversimplifying.

Open world is so established that it's hard to call any of those moves "trend chasing." Zelda started as an open world series. Mario Kart could be trend chasing Forza Horizon, I suppose, or Burnout… or Diddy Kong racing. I haven't played Prime 4 yet, but my understanding was that it's still classic Metroid interconnected spaces but with a pointless desert section in the middle. A better example of trend chasing would be the garbage voiced side characters with Marvel dialogue.

Prime 4 is your best bet for pointing out trend chasing in development, but that wasn't pushed for by investors, which was the comment you replied to was even talking about.

 

[Bonkerzzz]

I don't know if I would consider Nintendo the "good guy". Their lawyers were lobbing disingenuous lawsuits at Mom and Pop supermarkets in third world countries not too long ago, and they nuked all of our eshop purchases during the Wii and 3DS era with no efforts made towards backwards compatibility for those titles.

They're just the best available option in a list of bad choices for physical game preservation.

A lot of people don't think through the legal side of this, they react emotionally. It's easy to see a big corporation suing a small business and immediately assume the company is in the wrong, but IP law is more complicated than that. You don't have to like it, but there are legitimate business and legal reasons companies enforce their trademarks and copyrights consistently.

If they selectively ignore infringement, it can make enforcement more difficult later and encourage others to push the boundaries even further.

 

[Fabieter]

Don't worry. Nintendo will do some more BS soon. They always do.

Probably c&d a grandma making mario cupcakes for charity or something.

Hard to top ms and sony rn

 

[StueyDuck]

 

[John Bilbo]

You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain and a good guy.

 

[Zannegan]

All the subtlety and insight of your typical Polygon take. And of course their "good guy" status in Polygon's eyes has more to do with what they're doing for workers than consumers. We're still just a necessary evil.

Then again, I've only read the blurb in the OP. Maybe there's more to the article, but I'm on a multi-year streak of not clicking on Polygon articles, and I'd hate to break it.

 

[FalsettoVibe]

Such as?

The fact that you have to ask this question is something......

 

[Wildebeest]

Then next week Nintendo raise hardware prices by 100%.

 

[corgiix3]

Well i have to admit my disdain for key cards has forsure been lowered. Yea I can tolerate it as opposed to this actual dogshit alternative Sony wants

 

[DarkLordOtaku]

 

[Lionel Richie]

Such as?

I'm a Nintendo fanboy so there are haters in this thread who can answer you better, but just to give you one example, the joycon had notorious drift issues. The joycon 2 uses the same mechanism.

 

[Musashipan]

Yes
Has always been

 

[FalsettoVibe]

Well i have to admit my disdain for key cards has forsure been lowered. Yea I can tolerate it as opposed to this actual dogshit alternative Sony wants

How are key cards different than what Sony wants?

 

[FoxMcChief]

In an industry of shit, Nintendo is definitely one of the least shity. But they're still shity.

 

[simpatico]

Comic book brain comes right after synthetic hormones as the greatest threat to the modern gamer.

WHO'S THE GOOD GUY? BUT WHAT ABOUT THE BAD GUY?

 

[Danjin44]

I don't give rat ass if Nintendo are "good guy" or "bad guy".

I don't need company's friendship, I need them to supply what I demand and for me Nintendo dose exactly that while Sony no longer dose….simple as that.

 

[MrJangles]

No one is good, not one

Sega is. They broke our hearts because they loved us. They almost died for us.

And were a bit retarded tbh.

 

[Pejo]

NIntendo is the good guy as long as you have the memory of a goldfish and don't read the news.

 

[deriks]

"good guys" is a strong word

But for sure they're the only one that is a gaming company, and they're doing primary for the love of the thing since forever, with innovation to the whole industry and development wizardry

But remember that while the Wii was launched with the best tech demo ever included, and as a physical disc, Switch 2 was launched with a "eh" tech demo, digital only, for US$10. Always remember

 

[Clear]

Admits everyone hated game-key cards, now its a reason to celebrate ?

That's some consistent logic right there!

 

[OuterLimits]

Nintendo has many faults but the article makes a good point about layoffs and the last bastion apparently for physical games.

Retro isn't having major layoffs right now after the sales disappointment of Metroid Prime 4.

 

[Fabieter]

$80 for a game with 15 yo graphics.

And for asking 10 bucks less for digital games.

 

[DreamcastSkies]

Now? Feel like they've been a great company for a while. They carved out their own lane. Took over Japan. They succeed in every market. They grow their IP into other entertainment medium beyond video games (future proofing their company and IP), they take care of their staff and have low turn over, leadership were the ones penalized when the 3DS underperformed.

 

[cireza]

You can't push Game Key Cards and be the good guy. Wake up.

 

[Gallard]

How are key cards different than what Sony wants?

You can still lend key cards to your friends or sell them - so they retain value. They act like physical cards - the difference being you have to download once inserted.

Compare this to Sony's future all-digital platform where there is nothing physical - you can't sell nor lend it out.

GKCs are a reasonable middle-ground and practically a necessity in some cases. Consider FFVII Rebirth which is 102 GB when installed on Switch 2, when the maximum cart size they have is currently 64 GB. FFVII Rebirth would have required 2 full carts (assuming it could even be sequestered reasonably into 2 carts - with repeating assets, areas, etc). Considering carts are already ~3x more expensive than discs, it wouldn't have been financially tenable.

And Nintendo, to their credit, has put all their games entirely on the cart. GKCs are the cheaper alternative option they offer for 3rd parties who can't front the cost of the full cart to encourage them to still deliver something physical.

GKCs were always a reasonable measure so it boggles my mind that Nintendo was somehow branded villainous for this.

 

[Heimdall_Xtreme]

This culprit was the source of the trouble caused by those disastrous Keycards.

 

[Hero Of Hyrule]

They definitely seem to treat their employees better

Nintendo has raised its employees base salary by 10% (update)

Update: Kotaku says that the 10-percent salary increase took place over three years ago and that Mr. Furukawa was referencing that. Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa has stated to shareholders that…

mynintendonews.com

Nintendo CEO once halved his salary to prevent layoffs, and it worked—why that's so uncommon today

Nintendo's CEO once took a 50% pay cut to avoid layoffs. Here's why it worked for the video game company, says expert — and why it's not always a perfect fix.

www.cnbc.com

 

[ShadyAcshuns]

 

[Madjaba]

Nintendo is not the worst among the bad guys but are still bad guys though.

 

[Zannegan]

Admits everyone hated game-key cards, now its a reason to celebrate ?

That's some consistent logic right there!

I agree with you. The lesser of three evils is a hell of a hero to pick as your "good guy." On the other hand, as bad a solution as GCC are, at least they're tradable and convey some level of "ownership."

Ever since that one thread, I've been hoping that one good aspect of this AI disaster will be a Silicon Valley-style efficient form of compression and upscaling, allowing for larger games to be stored on smaller disks and carts… just in time for everyone to abandon physical media. -_-

At least they'll take up less hard drive space if it pans out.

 

[DeepEnigma]

There are no good guys, just the devil's you know.

 

[blacktout]

Man, as a Nintendo fanboy who hates Polygon, this article has me like:

 

[cartman414]

Nintendo has always loved you unlike every other company.

 

[bender]

Cease and desist. You are not bender .

 

[cartman414]

Cease and desist. You are not bender .

Hardass.

 

[bender]

Hardass.

It is metal...and shiny and sometimes gloriously gold or wooden.

 

[Werewolf Jones]

The best amongst monsters but still not a good company lmao.

 

[Arsic]

Nintendo is the least douchey company at the moment but they are still douchey.

It's sort of like if all the companies said you had to eat turds with piss on it, but Nintendo decided to skip the piss.

It's still a shitty deal.

 

[Hero_Select]

You know. At the very least you can lend them out and sell them back. Functionally they work like physical game carts but with a required download - like how a lot of game discs work now anyway.

 

[yogaflame]

Wait and see.