Nintendo Will Create a New Franchise

 

You read correctly, it was reported a day ago that there will be a new game franchise for the Nintendo.

After decades we’ve become familiar with Nintendo and their ability to milk a game franchise until it runs dry, turns brittle, and eventually crumbles into something that vaguely resembles the original. Nintendo hasn’t exactly thrown any major curve balls in the past decade, and they need to build a new image in order to adapt to new generations of gamers. Reworking old concepts can only go for so long until gamers will want something more. When I try to think of the Nintendo titles I can think of off the top of my head the list is riddled with consecutive titles under the same franchises. For instance: The Legend of Zelda, Mario, Super Smash Bros, Donkey Kong, Metroid, Kirby, Pokemon, and Animal Crossing.

Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of Mario and GM of Nintendo EAD, let slip to Famitsu (a Japanese gaming magazine) his intention to build a new franchise for Nintendo. Fortunately for us, Kotaku translated the dialogue between Shigeru Miyamoto and Famitsu. Shigeru Miyamoto says:

“With the recent version upgrade [of the Wii U], we’ve worked on the system side of things and we’re planning on further system tweaks ahead, but even as is, [the Wii U] has become a useful item for the living room. However, it’s pointless to talk about other features, no matter how fulfilling, without releasing games of our own, so we hope you’ll look forward to the games to come. Next Spring, with the release of Mario Kart 8, we’ll have a general selection available, so I’ve been thinking it would be a good time to bring out a new franchise.”

Famitsu replied, “A new franchise! An all-new title that you would be working on?”

Miyamoto responds with, “I can’t say too much in detail right now, but I’ve been pretty busy with this title these days.”

So, it is official, we can look forward to a whole new franchise from Nintendo. I didn’t know what to make of this news at first because I was afraid that with a new title, they might actually just stick to a pre-existing formula and just build new characters and story lines. This, however, was also addressed in one of Kotaku’s older posts as something he said to them during E3. From what I gather, I get the feeling that Nintendo will be doing a franchise with completely unique gameplay this time. He says to Kotaku:

“…we’re always focused on creating those new gameplay elements. When it comes to those new franchises, we can look at something like Nintendogs. And, because in Nintendogs the character was a dog, people didn’t really view that as new IP from Nintendo, and it was. And with Wii Fit, the same thing, people didn’t really look at that as new IP.

I think, from my perspective, we’re always trying to do new things, so even if we’re doing it within the same formula it’s still a new experience. And, apart from that, I’m also working on a lot of other projects where I’m experimenting with new things.”

“Experimenting with new things” in these new projects around the very same time he has announced a new franchise leads me to believe that he is attempting to create a whole new type of gameplay for the new franchise. I could just be really eager to find out what the finished product is an as such, I could be getting way ahead of myself, but I’ve been wanting a new Nintendo franchise for ages. My favorite console during my youth was undoubtedly the NES and it only changed because of a lack of game originality. I think maybe my desire (as well as many others’) for a new franchise may be too strong to be met with a good franchise. I think that hype alone and the time we’ve waited has created a void that only a great franchise could fill. Hopefully Nintendo can deliver us something really enjoyable. In the meantime lets discuss, in a perfect world where we get what we want, what genre of game we’d like the new franchise to be and what features could send this out of the park. Please comment or join us in the forums. I’d really like to talk about this one.
Join the Forum discussion on this post