Once again Reggie Fils-Aime has come to the defense of Nintendo, crying out that they have not abandoned the “hardcore” gamer. Unfortunately, the examples he cites aren’t quite convincing. A new Zelda title only releases when the planets are in alignment and another side-scrolling Mario title leaves a bit to be desired. The 18-30 audience is looking for something meaty to sink their teeth into and they want it now.

I’m not saying Nintendo is to blame or that they have abandoned anyone. Let’s face it, Nintendo has put out a group of titles that cater to a number of audiences. If you don’t want Animal Crossing or Mario then you have Zelda, Battalion Wars, Metroid or Fire Emblem to choose from. Heck, two of those games even have guns! Guns are always hardcore.

As a first party Nintendo is managing as best as they can. The real issue here is communication. While they are taking the blame for the lack of substantial “hardcore” content (and as many of you should recall, I find such labels to be ridiculous), the source is actually the third parties and the gamers themselves. This doesn’t mean Nintendo isn’t without guilt, however. What we have is a global problem.

In terms of third party developers, few are putting genuine effort into creating titles for the platform. Why would anyone play Call of Duty on the Wii when they can play it with better graphics and performance on the Xbox 360 or Playstation 3? Even titles that are built from the ground-up for the Wii manage to be lacking in the basics of quality. Somehow Quake 2 is fun to this day and yet The Conduit becomes a bland experience whose only value is the online multiplayer. This is one of the games that Nintendo displayed at this year’s E3 to show that they aren’t ignoring the hardcore gamer.

At the same time, while smaller studios could get noticed more easily on the Nintendo Wii based on the less-beefy hardware, they flock to the Xbox 360 instead. The XNA platform and lower costs make a higher-end platform more beneficial for new developers. Nintendo needs to keep communication with developers and provide incentives for small studios to experiment on their platform instead.

Granted Nintendo could also help developers as much as they’d like, it still wouldn’t guarantee a good third party game. Small budgets attempting to mimic big budgets can result in a complete joke of a game. This is where the third parties are at fault. The Conduit was boring because the environments were large but empty and the enemies were simple and largely homogeneous. Similarly, rail-shooters aren’t a good substitute for first-person shooters. Instead, go back in time and figure out what made games on less powerful platforms enjoyable.

How is this not hardcore?

Wait, they don’t have to! Resident Evil 4 continues to be one of the best Wii games despite being a GameCube port. What makes the game so fun isn’t the enemy A.I. or the physics. The sheer numbers that the player is met with in addition to the difficulty make it an adrenaline pumping experience. Want to get noticed on the Nintendo Wii? Don’t make a game that is forgiving to a family audience. Instead make a game that is brutal and demands perfection.

Let’s also take a game like Halo into account. The Wii is supposed to be more powerful than the first Xbox, so it should be perfectly reasonable to expect a game that looks and plays like Halo is possible. Some of what made the franchise so fun was the variety of foes. It wasn’t just a bunch of soldiers that shot at you or even ducked for cover. It was a horde of weaker yet plentiful enemies surrounding stronger foes with energy shields, not to mention the Jackals with physical shields, the Hunters whose backs were the only vulnerable spot, foes on turrets, flying banshees and mortar tanks bombarding your location and the numerous Flood threatening to overtake your position. A game can have very simple A.I. as long as there is some creativity put into who you are fighting.

It is completely unreasonable to think games such as Maximo, Fable, Morrowind, Armored Core 2, Shadow of the Colossus or Oddworld: Stranger cannot also be made on the Wii. In order to compete against the advanced graphics of the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 a studio should instead adapt an art style. Be it the anime-like appearance of Dead or Alive characters, the Pixar style Mario Galaxy look, or the cel-shading styles of Viewtiful Joe, all it takes to combat realism is to take on a unique appearance.

Finally, the gamers themselves. You eagerly await a title such as MadWorld, which is only well-known due to its violent nature, and then you don’t even purchase it. I’m completely aware that a lot of these potentially great titles turn into disappointments, but the less the games sell the less interest the publishers will see. If you want more hardcore games on the Wii you have to take the risk into purchasing the games that try and take advantage of the system. Neither No More Heroes nor MadWorld focused on physics engines or A.I. or graphics, but instead took unique art styles and focused efforts on fun gameplay. There was no attempt to mimic God of War or Ninja Gaiden, and as such the games were fun.

If you want to see more hardcore titles on the Nintendo Wii, then go take a look at the wall of games. Give Okami a try, or the newly released Muramasa: The Demon Blade.

No, Nintendo is not doing all that they can to improve the state of “core” titles on their games console. Yet it is not their sole responsibility. If you as a gamer want titles focused to your interests, you need to be able to point at not only specific games but the fun traits of them that you desire. As for developers, it would just be nice to see you do your job and develop something instead of just copying what you see and pasting it into a destined failure.

Author’s note: Unfortunately, this article only scratches the surface of all that can be said on the topic. To write all my thoughts and feelings would take up too much space. Maybe I’ll split it into a multi-part feature one day, but as of now this is it. Yes I’m not satisfied with the Wii’s library either, but I do not blame this fact on Nintendo. Not completely, at least. I primarily blame it on the publishers, developers and gamers that would rather push all the blame onto Nintendo.

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