For this article, I have looked in several forums related to this topic to find out just what kinds of games that gamers want to see on Nintendo consoles and, by extension, what kinds of games they want Nintendo to make. I will also be detailing some of the ideas these people stated, to give an idea of what some gamers are thinking about.
1. First-Person Shooters
First-person shooters are the most highly requested genre for Nintendo to make a new game in, with multiplatform games like Call of Duty and Battlefield and Xbox series like Halo and Gears of War still at the forefront of a lot of people’s minds. While Nintendo already has the Metroid Prime games, others have been quick to state that it is more of a first-person adventure game and doesn’t really count. Nintendo also has Splatoon, but gamers have also stated that they want a first-person, not third-person, shooter, even more so, one with a mature tone and storyline.
Suggestions have ranged from a remake of the Nintendo published GameCube shooter Geist to a main console sequel to the DS game Metroid Prime Hunters, with selectable characters replacing swappable weapon sets. Some have also suggested a modern revival of the NES light gun game Wild Gunman as a Wild West online FPS, acquiring the rights to series like Perfect Dark or TimeSplitters, or even just making a brand new IP in the genre.
2. Traditional 2D Fighters
While Nintendo already has a successful fighting game series in the platform fighter Super Smash Brothers, a lot of people want Nintendo to make a more traditional 2D fighting game, similar to Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat, or The King of Fighters. This niche used to be filled by Killer Instinct when Rare was part of Nintendo, until the developer got sold to Microsoft. Several requests have been made to Nintendo for this kind of game to be made. They include acquiring the rights to the Bloody Roar series from Konami and Hudson, working with Capcom to make Nintendo vs. Capcom, or reviving series like Urban Champion or Joy Mech Fight as traditional fighting games with complex mechanics as seen in pro tournament games like Street Fighter.
The Wii U game Pokken Tournament, a Pokemon fighting game developed by Namco Bandai, is scheduled for release in March 2016, but time will tell if it’s the fighting game fans are asking for.
3. Open World/Sandbox Adventures
The draw of an open-world game is having a large wide open area where you can go anywhere and do anything you want within that world, even if what you want to do is cause mayhem and spread chaos. That is the reason games like Grand Theft Auto, Saints Row, Just Cause, Skyrim, and more have become so popular in recent years and that is why a lot of people imagine what Nintendo could do with an entry in this genre.
Alongside the calls for a new IP exploring this genre, made by an internal Nintendo studio, several Nintendo titles have been stated as candidates for the open-world treatment including a Legend of Zelda title with a large world to explore (which many people think the upcoming Wii U title is going to be), an F-Zero game focusing on Captain Falcon’s bounty hunting career alongside his F-Zero races, a revival of the NES title Mach Rider as a gritty sci-fi open-world driving game, and an open world western based on the Dillon’s Rolling Western series.
4. Western RPGs
For this genre, it seems the biggest influences here are the success of games like Skyrim, Fallout, The Witcher, and Mass Effect. While some of these games may offer the freedom of choice seen in open-world games, they are more known for having complex characters that the player can interact with and deep and branching storylines that the player can affect with the choices they make, either in dialogue choices of actions in gameplay. This is one of the genres that make video games more like interactive movies.
Mostly, gamers want Nintendo to have a new original IP in this genre, preferably with a western director at the helm. Commonly stated developers have included Bethesda, CD Projekt Red, Electronic Arts and others. As far as adapting existing Nintendo properties, two of those mentioned were GameCube title Geist for a supernatural themed world or NES title StarTropics for a quirky, lighthearted storyline and characters.
5. Visual Novel
For gamers who want a good story and characters more than anything else from their gaming experience, visual novels are one of the best genres to turn to. With games like Ace Attorney as the main example, it is seen as a low budget was to release a new game with a good and engaging story. Nintendo has several series that could fill this niche with a new entry like Detective Club, Hotel Dusk, Another Code, or Tokimeki High School, but with Nintendo’s focus more on creating innovative game controls, some people think it’s unlikely that they would focus on making a simple visual novel game. They think that Nintendo would try to make some new control scheme that would separate it from others in this genre, but say they would welcome it if it actually helps the storytelling process.
6. Real Time Strategy
Though real-time strategy is a genre more associated with PCs, with game consoles becoming more powerful, many want to see RTS games used more on consoles and Nintendo is no exception. As far as Nintendo goes here, some say that Pikmin could count for this genre, but some say that this is a single-player action strategy game while they are asking for a competitive multiplayer game with complex mechanics, similar to StarCraft or XCOM. Ideas have been thrown around for RTS games based on series like Advance Wars and The Legend of Zelda and even a game based around wars between various Nintendo villains and the armies they would lead. The Wii U gamepad was thought to be able to work well for a genre like this, being able to just select a unit to manipulate with the controller’s touchscreen, but with the Wii U fading out, most of this talk has switched to the NX.
7. Japanese RPGs
Another game genre driven by deep storylines and engaging characters making games seem more like interactive movies if done right, Japanese RPGs, or JRPG for short, usually contain storytelling conventions, gameplay mechanics, and character archetypes that are more commonly found in Japanese-made games than western-made ones. A lot of gamers want to see JRPGs arrive in a large way on Nintendo home consoles, not as Virtual Console games or indie games that call back to the classic era, but as main console releases. Nintendo has recently provided a new entry in the Xenoblade Chronicles series from Monolith Soft, but that’s just one series.
Gamers have suggested partnerships with several developers including Square-Enix, Mistwalker, XSEED, Atlus, Namco Bandai, and others with experience making well-known JRPGs. Remakes or remasters of games like The Last Story or EarthBound have also been suggested, along with new entires in games like Golden Sun influenced by more complex RPGs like Persona, the Tales series, and Final Fantasy. The public has even suggested a Kingdom Hearts style Nintendo crossover game, like Super Smash Brothers as an RPG.
8. MMORPGs
Along with real-time strategy, MMOs are among those genres that have been exclusive to PCs until advancements in game console technology seem to make it more possible. Several ideas have been thrown around for a Nintendo MMO, especially ones based around Nintendo’s current franchises. In a Pokemon MMO, several players could travel the region or regions in the world, catching and raising their Pokemon and battling other player Trainers, while Legendaries or villain teams like Team Rocket could serve as area bosses or sparking special events that multiple trainers could participate in. A Zelda MMO could have several heroes from different races stepping up to save Hyrule from evil after Link goes missing. A Super Smash Brothers MMO could have avatars help the canon characters of different Nintendo worlds solving different crises and possibly gaining new equipment based on these different series.
A whole article could be made just speculating on what Nintendo MMOs based on different series could be like, but the main draw for this genre is being able to interact with other players while adventuring across a wide-open world.
9. Survival Horror
Survival horror games have been a genre that Nintendo has rarely touched over the years. Nintendo tried this back in the GameCube era with its first-party game Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem, a highly praised game, and in the current Wii U era with Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water, released to mixed results. Neither were really paid much attention to and went largely ignored. With many blaming to Nintendo’s approach to marketing (or lack thereof) for these games, fans of survival horror want to see more of the types of games the other consoles are seeing arriving on Nintendo.
Nintendo currently does not have much to offer here aside from another Fatal Frame game (which may be given a low-key release like the last one) or a sequel to Eternal Darkness (unlikely seeing what happened to the original developers), so many see Nintendo publishing a new IP as the only alternative.
10. Toys to Life Action Games
Requests for this mainly stem from how Nintendo has handled its Amiibo line of NFC figures. While Activision, Disney, and now Lego all have their own toys to life games released to massive success, Nintendo has yet to give a similar experience with their Amiibo figures. Most people who buy them simply buy them as collectibles to display on a shelf, because the few games that do integrate Amiibo functionality either handle it in a small capacity (like Super Smash Brothers 4) or are not interesting enough to hold players’ attention (like Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival).
Fans have suggested that Nintendo take some cues from the other big toys to life games and release an action RPG game that use Amiibo figures to access different characters in the game, perhaps as a stand-alone sequel to The Subspace Emissary from Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Some have even suggested a Nintendo MOBA to use this functionality. Playable characters don’t even have to be limited to Smash Amiibo. The Inklings from Splatoon, the Yarn Yoshis, the characters from Animal Crossing, or even third-party Amiibos like Shovel Knight could have some kind of functionality in a game like this from playable characters to unlocking extra missions.
There were several ideas stated for new genres for Nintendo to work in and these were only ten of the most popular, so what do you think? What genres do you think Nintendo should make a new game in? Say what you think in the comments below and thanks for viewing.
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