Nintendo E3 2008 Press Conference and Expo Staff Soapbox
It’s later and more low-key than Miyamoto’s Pikmin announcement, but the staff have all decided to dust off the Vooks Soapbox to voice their opinions about their post-press conference thoughts. Who (if any) enjoyed it? What the hell was wrong with it? Come inside and find out the Staff’s thoughts on the Conference. If you’re lucky, you might see a couple of Staff Members giving an actual grade for the press conference! Joy! More inside
James
Coming off Microsoft’s press conference I was interested to see what Nintendo were going to do to try and counter the opposition, after all, Microsoft’s press conference was very interesting in that it appeared that they were gearing towards the audience that Nintendo have already won over.
When Nintendo opened their press conference with a third party title, and a woman who was bragging about how she was a mum and her kids found her cool because she worked for Nintendo, I was really worried. In fact, nothing could explain how worried I was. Many people have used the excuse “”E3 is not for us guys, it’s for the gaming press”” but how can anyone seriously justify this conference being written in such a manner? Cammie asked the audience (male, gaming journalists) “”Who likes puppies?””, only to be followed by an embarassing and awkward silence. All in all, Nintendo failed to deliver in terms of providing engaging, genuine speakers to get the listeners in.
As for the contents of the conference, it was overly disappointing. Reggie’s “”We have too many games but we’ll show you three less anticipated ones”” mantra was not something that impressed me. We got three games, with only one of them being a unique title that is exclusive to Nintendo’s system (Clone Wars) and the other being an exclusive sequel and finally a multi-platform shooter. These games were also third party. I guess what my biggest problem with E3 this year was that Nintendo didn’t bring out any of the big guns. A few years ago they had a press conference that showed off Metroid Prime, Twilight Princess, Smash Bros Brawl and several other high profile franchises from Nintendo. Instead we get lumped with several notably low key releases (comparitively speaking, of course) Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars sounds like a joke and a slap in the face to gamers who wanted “”core games””. To top that off, all we saw was a logo.
When Shigeru Miyamoto was announced to be speaking at E3, I was excited – I was certain we’d see him jump out with his sword and shield or perform some similar stunt to when Zelda: Twilight Princess was announced. What do I get instead? Some horrible drummer along with a terrible music game that requires no skill at all. Sure, it appeals to those who don’t want to play an instrument but seriously who likes the idea of “”shaking a remote”” and “”making noise””? If anything, Wii Music is an interactive modern day rattle that only a child will play with. A disappointment overall considering how amazing and innovative Wii Fit and Wii Sports have been.
My biggest pleasure from E3 from Nintendo was something that we knew before E3. Wii MotionPlus. This peripheral has countless possibilities and I would’ve thought Nintendo’s conference was amazing if it had been announced there and then. It would’ve been amazing but instead we had that surprise “”spoiled”” for reasons I cannot imagine – Microsoft didn’t even announce a motion sensitive controller. Wii MotionPlus is something I eagerly await, and I was pleased to see Wii Sports Resort featured sword fighting – something EVERY Wii owner has dreamed off since playing Red Steel.
All in all, the announcement of MotionPlus was amazing and definitely holds a great weighting towards my ranking of the conferences, but unfortunately everything else was stale, the speakers were incredibly fake and lacked anything I could connect with. Reggie really disappointed me with his post conference comments – Animal Crossing and GTA DS do not satisfy a core gamer, even worth noting that GTA is infamous for appealing to more casuals than core gamers.
Outside of sequels to third party franchises and a new peripheral, Nintendo really had nothing this year and I even found the Sony conference more engaging, and the speaker there was just as unlikeable (for me) as the speakers at Nintendo’s.
MotionPlus saved this conference and Nintendo’s E3 offerings, but only just.
Grade: C
1:1 and a Microphone finally.
Eyce
While not on the Epic-Fail levels of Sonys Giant Enemy Crab, I have to admit that choosing Cammie Dunaway as not only a Speaker, but the opener was the dumbest idea ever. I understand that she might have enthusiasm, but to begin a video games press conference by blabbering on about irrelevant self-inflicted injuries and stories about being a Mother was the wrong thing to do, even from a Casual-Oriented perspective. Her mouth was as big as Stephen Tylers and she just looked fake.
It appears as if Nintendo chose her to break the ice with a couple of shots at attempted humour, but its clear that if you were a viewer that she completely fell flat. Come to think of it, the only time that Nintendo got some form of applause was a passing announcement of Grand Theft Auto on the DS. Now if the First Party Titles got absolutely no reaction, wouldnt that be setting off alarm bells?
The whole press conference looked to have sent most of the audience asleep, particularly the rather horrible M. Night Shyamalan lookalike attempting to play Air Drums. Oh, and please Dunaway with Dunaway, shes a horrible Mouthpiece Nintendo. If I were to give the press conference a grade… well put it this way- Id be keeping Nintendo back for a chat after class.
The above games called, they want their contracts back.
Vook
Where to begin? Recapping this near absolute train wreck of a conference? Now let me be clear, unlike my fellow staff members and the most of the internet, Im not too unhappy with what Nintendo showed. It’s more about what they didnt show and how they presented it. If what Miyamoto is true and the E3 is no longer for the core gamer then why all these sale figures, surely the Mom and Dad gamers the E3 is now catering too dont care about them?
Iwatas message about paradigms shifting, and how now Nintendo must continue to innovate or people will get bored because everyone is copying them is 100% true and it’s good to see that Nintendo is willing to make that change and become better and improve themselves. However this message is totally lost when Reggie says we have so many games, but well just show you three, all of which used the Wiimote in three different ways and were different- but none of which are entirely new. Its also strange that Ubisofts Shaun White Snowboarding got top billing (so to speak) at the conference, we all knew the game was coming and it supported the Wii Balance Board so why not lump it with the rest of the third party games?
This years conference, no matter who it was aimed at, was completely and utterly messed up. Things where out of order, Shiggys Wii music demo has now left people with an Oh its that type of thing thought in their heads. ‘That type of thing’ being a embellished toy.
So whats positive from the conference? MotionPlus sure is, even though they only showed it on two games and its going to be at least a year before we see it in on any Third Party games. Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars was a good announcement; the new Guitar Hero on the DS is no surprise, with the Wii, apart from Animal Crossing, lacked ‘oomph’. Wii Sports Resort looks nice enough and will sell 10 million copies but from what weve seen the 1:1 just doesnt look like a deal breaker just yet.
So in short, the lack of anything really new was the main disappointment for me. The MotionPlus we knew about a couple of days beforehand, Animal Crossing was expected and apart from a few DS games it was all a known quantity.
The real question I have is that if E3 is not for the core gamer, then what is? More silent announcements from Japanese Retail Briefings?
Grade: C
Core gamers no longer the E3’s target – So get your Nan up at 2am then?
Anthony
While waiting for the Nintendo conference to begin I had only one small expectation: to see some games. Expectations have a habit of letting everybody down and so I dropped my own expectations as low as I possibly could. Sure enough even that simple and innocent enough expectation let me down.
Their conference was the same tired casual gamer presentation we have seen before. They are terrible displays that look like a lot of fun to be a part of, but are dull and painfully long to bare witness to. We watched so-called celebrities play so-called games and listened to really bad humour with matching bad stories. It appears expecting to see games while at a game expo conference is too much these days.
The MotionPlus demonstration was the only part of the conference that held my interest. It certainly wasn’t the game (*cough* tech-demo *cough*) but the technology behind it that was so exciting. The rest of the conference I battled sleep and boredom while I tried to keep my attention on the screen.
E3 is the premier expo for video games. The casual market should not be the primary focus there. I am well aware of Nintendo’s new attitude towards E3, but I think it is absolute garbage. All major expos cater towards their most die-hard fans, so then I guess E3 is unique? It caters towards an audience that isn’t even aware the event is on.
There are millions of gamers watching E3 with uncharacteristically open minds. They are deciding the next 12 months of their purchases based on what they see. It is one of the few days in the year where the media literally pays to see video game advertisements! If we were to listen to Nintendo we would believe throwing away this golden opportunity is a wise decision. All the other industries know not to make a mockery of their major events, but Nintendo seem to think they can. The criticism they have received is well earned.
Creating a new market is a great achievement. Having a strong identity and a clear future is very important, but E3 belongs to the gamers. Demonstrate WiiSports Resort at the next Red Bull event or WiiMusic at the next stupid Tupperware party. I do not care where. Just do not do it again at E3!
Grade: D
Will we ever see anything like this again? I mean a Zelda trailer, not Shiggy clowning around… again.
Theo
I am definitely in the minority when I say that Nintendo’s presence at E3 2008 was a roaring success. I know that even my colleagues here at Vooks.net will disagree with me on this point and some out there will probably question whether I watched the same conference, but I believe Nintendo achieved all of the objectives it had set going in to E3 2008.
Why do I believe the conference was a complete success. A lot has changed since the Wii was revealed to the world. After watching its market share in the home console market dwindle towards single digits, Nintendo redefined not only how video games are played, but also who can play them. The so called casual market has now gone from niche oddity to the majority, and even E3 has undergone some major changes along the way.
The E3 of 2008 is a more civilised, and some would say, sterile place to showcase upcoming games. These changes, whether they are for the better or worse, have altered the landscape and changed what is required of an E3 press conference. I think Shigeru Miyamoto got it right when he said E3 was an opportunity for Nintendo to “”introduce new concepts and new types of play that we intend to bring to the broader audience, particularly because of the media that gathers at E3 now””. E3 is no longer about fanboys from the specialised gaming media cheering at press conferences, it is about taking video games to a mass market audience via the mass market media. E3, like gaming, has moved into the casual realm!
If you think of E3 in this manner, Nintendo certainly “”won”” E3. The mainstream media covered far more of Nintendo’s announcements than anything presented by Microsoft or Sony. If the announcement of Final Fantasy XIII on the Xbox 360 was megaton news on video gaming websites, then it didn’t even register as a blip with the mainstream media. Nintendo’s conference on the other hand scored multiple hits with mainstream media around the world, especially the much maligned Wii Music.
One of the biggest complaints from specialised gaming media about the “”new”” Nintendo has been that it seems to have abandoned the hardcore gamers. I don’t think this is the case and I strongly believe we will see some major announcements about the more hardcore Nintendo offerings at upcoming events that are specifically targeted at the specialised gaming media. It makes sense to focus on the causal games at E3 because E3 is the only time video game companies have direct access to the world’s mainstream media. Why would Nintendo waste this once a year opportunity to showcase a bunch of games that don’t interest the readers of mainstream media?
Anyone with a rudimentary understanding of marketing and communication theory would understand why Nintendo chose to go in this direction with its E3 press conference. (Remember Reggie comes from a marketing background). It is a simple matter of communicating with the right audience. The audience of the current E3 is the mainstream consumer through the mainstream media, and Nintendo certainly mananged to get the most attention from that audience. Therefore Nintendo won E3.
