The Nintendo Wii U is Great Thread

[Thrik]

I don't get how Nintendo games hold their price for so long. I was in my local supermarket, and noticed all those Ps4/Xbone games released in November are between 33%-50% off their original price (with Drive Club being only £25! Almost enough to tempt me to buy the broken game). DK Tropical Freeze on the other hand is still full price despite coming out in February(?) last year.

 

Nintendo is basically the gaming equivalent of Disney in this regard. It just doesn't reduce its prices because it realises that a great game is still great and worth good money even after the increasingly short release window that publishers, press, and gamers have become increasingly obsessed with — especially considering that so many people are perpetually behind with games.

 

I honestly had no interest in Tropical Freeze watching its video reviews. But then I watched playthrougs without any commentary and got the charm of it - the soundtrack is essential to the overall feel of the game, I guess, so fucking beautiful.

 

Yeah, this is a big factor in what made the

work so well too. I guess it's a bit like how so much of the charm and atmosphere of a game like Monkey Island (2+) or Grim Fandango would be sapped out without their soundtracks — they add more than is typical for most games because they're just so intrinsically perfect for the environments they accompany, going beyond merely complementing them.

 

Such a wise move (ha ha) for them to dump the weak-ish remix approach of DKC: Returns and get the original composer back in for Tropical Freeze.

[tegan]

I don't get how Nintendo games hold their price for so long. I was in my local supermarket, and noticed all those Ps4/Xbone games released in November are between 33%-50% off their original price (with Drive Club being only £25! Almost enough to tempt me to buy the broken game). DK Tropical Freeze on the other hand is still full price despite coming out in February(?) last year. 

 

The reason they can get away with it is because most games have a tremendous drop in sales after a few weeks, but people will keep buying a new Mario Kart or Pokémon for that console's entire lifespan.

[Griddlelol]

Strange how it works. I wonder if it's the dynamics of who generally owns Nintendo systems. I feel the classic "Nintendo is for children" is wrong, since any parents with children I know (which I admit isn't many) have bought their child a Ps4. So I doubt it's anything to do with age of consumer. 

[Thrik]

I think it's more to do with the fact that people buy Nintendo consoles to play Nintendo games. They exist in a whole ecosystem of their own, with the consoles primarily being buy-in to access certain first- or second-party games. It's actually quite similar to Apple, where to a certain extent buying a Mac or an iPad is a route to being able to use OS X or iOs, and the often excellent applications exclusive to those platforms — which never reduce in price.

[Bjorn]

I think there are other examples of it as well. Call of Duty tends to stay at a higher price to comparable games much, much longer. All Blizzard games hold their prices for years compared to competitors.

[dium]

I understand how Blizzard can get away with that (they release games infrequently and continue to update them for years), but how on earth does Call of Duty manage when there's a new one every year?

[JonCole]

I don't think that trend has held true for the last couple games. Advanced Warfare has already been either $30 or $40 on sale and it's not even been out for a full quarter. Ghosts pitiful price curve probably screwed AW, that game was $20 within 6 months and the season pass even went on sale a couple times on console at least. Of course the whole season pass thing still makes COD come out to higher than a regular game's original MSRP even with sales, so I imagine they're still doing good.

[Zeusthecat]

Thanks for the well wishes on the kidney stone guys! I got a CT scan and it turns out I had a bunch of star bits all up in my kidneys. The only treatment in my case is to find a luma to feed them to.

[dium]

star bits all up in my kidneys

 

[syntheticgerbil]

Well I guess all of those Club Nintendo coins I thought I was going to make use of at some point is just going to be pissed away.

 

Maybe I should just buy whatever is left in the store and hock it on ebay later?

[JonCole]

They're going to be adding one last, large round of new stuff next month so I'd wait until then and then consider cashing out & eBaying if desired.

[Bjorn]

Thanks for the well wishes on the kidney stone guys! I got a CT scan and it turns out I had a bunch of star bits all up in my kidneys. The only treatment in my case is to find a luma to feed them to.

 

2015: Year of the star bit

[undermind9]

Well I guess all of those Club Nintendo coins I thought I was going to make use of at some point is just going to be pissed away.

 

Maybe I should just buy whatever is left in the store and hock it on ebay later?

 

i was hoping to accumulate enough for a free Earthbound VC...but i am out ~120 coins.  now no idea what to spend them on, i'll see what happens in Feb like JonCole said and cash out then

 

maybe get some Mario & Luigi greeting cards 

[Twig]

I logged into my Club Nintendo for the first time since linking my Wee Woo/Nintendo Network ID to the account, and for some reason none of my recent digital purchase games are showing up on Club Nintendo. I mean I've bought... quite a bit since I got my job, so I should have a ton of coins. Alas, I do not. Hmmm? Even 3DS purchases, which have shown up in the past, are not showing up now.

[JonCole]

I logged into my Club Nintendo for the first time since linking my Wee Woo/Nintendo Network ID to the account, and for some reason none of my recent digital purchase games are showing up on Club Nintendo. I mean I've bought... quite a bit since I got my job, so I should have a ton of coins. Alas, I do not. Hmmm? Even 3DS purchases, which have shown up in the past, are not showing up now.

 

This happened to me too. I imagine that the link between my eShop account and my Club Nintendo account got messed up at some point, so I unlinked it and relinked it. Bought one of the cheap Picross games to test it out and now it's registering my purchases properly. Seems like I only missed out on a handful of purchases, like 2 retail games and Shovel Knight. And apparently there's no way to claim these past digital purchases, just in case you were thinking about that as a possibility.

[Twig]

Actually it turns out my to-do history for surveys was just in a completely random order - like feb 10, 2013 -> dec 2, 2014 -> aug 17, 2013 - which is of course completely nonsensical. It also turns out digital purchase surveys expire after a week.

 

...Why, I don't know. Guess Nintendo was afraid of people hoarding surveys to get coins later for... for some dumb reason. Oh well. I've never felt like I was missing out on anything great, and I'm sure that will be the case here, too.

[undermind9]

i missed out an handful of surveys & registration of digital games (thus why i am out 120 coins for platinum status & no earthbound). It seems asinine to me that if a product is bought from the eShop why doesnt it auto-register to your linked club account. There could be some justification for the surveys, but not a strong one.  Thanks Nintendo

 

 

Perhaps their Club-v2.0 will have a more modern approach to registration, rewards, cross buy, and some sweet achievos

[Twig]

It does auto register, or it should, it did for me, it just doesn't notify you or remind you to fill out the dumb surveys, without which you get no coins. |:

[syntheticgerbil]

Well I hope these Mario and Luigi Greeting Cards have insane resale value!

[kaputt]

It seems Donkey Kong Country Returns is up on eShop. So, should I buy the Wii or 3DS version? I assume the 3DS one might not be as cheap, but people make a huge deal about seemingly bad motion controls on the Wii version.

[N1njaSquirrel]

there were motion controls in the wii one? I thought it used just the d pad and 1 & 2. I plan on getting the wii one, as I heard the 3DS one was a shoddy import. :/

[Twig]

The original DKR on Wii had motion controls which, unlike the amazing Super Mario Galaxy, were actually just complete garbage. You had to shake the remote to roll. It ain't no good. Get it for 3DS, I say. (Although I haven't played it on 3DS, so...)

[Thrik]

Skip the fucker and get Tropical Freeze. It's a much more complete and worthy successor, unlike Returns which was pretty decent but lacking in some key areas — particularly controls and absence of water levels(!!!!!). The things that did work in Returns will seem so much better if experienced as part of the vastly better overall package that is its sequel.

[miffy495]

I got it on 3DS as my Platinum reward last year and have previously beaten it on Wii. It's fine on 3DS, though performance hitches a bit with 3D on and the 3D isn't done nearly as well as other first party games anyway. The Wii version was totally fine, and I don't remember having any problems with the motion roll. It was a shitty band-aid on the "this remote only really has two buttons" problem though, so the SNES-pad layout of the 3DS is really nice.

[Thrik]

Ah man, the polar bear boss in DKC: Tropical Freeze is brilliant! The boss levels in general are excellent, I don't think I've seen any other game so bravely have its bosses combine shitloads of moves in no particular order like this before. Every encounter plays out differently, rather than adhering to the linear sequences found in most platformers.

Also, Donkey Kong is kind of an asshole here. Knocks the poor guy's ice lolly into the water and then beats him up when he's rightfully incensed.