Board 8 > How do we feel about Nintendo's recent strategy of free content updates?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Notably Pokemon Snap, and Mario Golf.

On one hand of course, free updates and content is great, but the trade-off seems to be a bare bones, or light on content initial release, and there's no guarantee or anyway to know how many updates they'll actually do.

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I found Pokemon Snap to have a good amount of content at the start, and I was satisfied before the DLC. If any game felt lacking before it got content updates, it would be Kirby Star Allies

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I would rather them just wait and put everything in a normally-short game unless the content updates are A) mapped out in advance for everyone to see, and B) come relatively soon after the game's release. If they're like "Ah man we just needed a little more time and didn't realize it so just give them what we have and we'll fix it later" then sure. I don't like intentionally slow-feeding stuff though.

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I haven't played the DLC yet but the base game for New Pokemon Snap was not bare bones at all.
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If it's free, I can either take it or leave it.

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yeah Snap and Golf are nowhere near the same ballpark

I've still gotta get around to completing Snap

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Depends entirely on how it's implemented. I agree that Nintendo isn't really consistent on what they do with it. Snap seemed like a full game so more stuff is a nice surprise.

Something like Animal Crossing is a more interesting example. I've seen a lot of complaints about how that's being handled. It isn't exactly that the game wasn't fleshed out at launch but it was missing a lot of series staples that have been put on an incredibly slow drip-feed.

Or Mario Party - launching without online multiplayer only to add it two and a half years later is just very weird. That one didn't seem planned though.

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I'm all for it if the alternative is half-baked games never getting new content or they try to make us pay for the content to fill out the game in comparison to what prior entries offered.

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There's rumors that the free update for Snap is just stuff that didn't make it in time for release. And it's too soon to judge Golf so, I think you're getting ahead of yourself calling this a recent strategy.

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Emeraldegg posted...

I would rather them just wait and put everything in a normally-short game unless the content updates are A) mapped out in advance for everyone to see, and B) come relatively soon after the game's release. If they're like "Ah man we just needed a little more time and didn't realize it so just give them what we have and we'll fix it later" then sure. I don't like intentionally slow-feeding stuff though.

you do know you can just wait to buy the game, right?

Tennis was more in-line with Golf as initially bare but added on later

but I also simply really loved Aces's gameplay so I was satisfied

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Buffy_Summers posted...

you do know you can just wait to buy the game, right?

I do! But it's not wrong of people to buy a game, see that it's barebones, go "ugh this isn't what I paid for!", get rid of it, and then get upset when more stuff comes out later.

If a dev releases a game, they're saying it's ready to play and is a good game experience. People aren't wrong to feel misled by a game release when it being a good experience is untrue. "Just wait to buy it" isn't necessarily a wrong stance, but it's one that shouldn't be needed in the first place.

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I am wishing they had done this for Sword/Shield which felt halfway finished at best and then had paid DLC come out afterwards.though ideally it would have been fully finished at launch with the DLC content just being part of the game.

Emeraldegg posted...

People aren't wrong to feel misled by a game release when it being a good experience is untrue.

This is far from objective, though.

For instance, I have a great experience playing Mario Golf, but that's because I enjoy the online multiplayer much more than I would the minigames like Ring Golf that people want. In the case of both Tennis and Golf, they made it clear ahead of launch that more content would be coming, and you know exactly what you are buying, so there's no misleading going on.

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HashtagSEP posted...

This is far from objective, though.

For instance, I have a great experience playing Mario Golf, but that's because I enjoy the online multiplayer much more than I would the minigames like Ring Golf that people want. In the case of both Tennis and Golf, they made it clear ahead of launch that more content would be coming, and you know exactly what you are buying, so there's no misleading going on.

Sure, but I like to think there is something of an understood line here. If someone "unrealistically" expects 1000 hours of gameplay from a mario golf game, then I think it's pretty clear that person is just being absurd, even if you can't point to hard proof for something like that. As you said it's subjective. Whereas if you're expecting something much more reasonable, like I dunno...like swordz mentioned how SwSh is generally seen as an underwhelming game but most people were super hyped and expecting a lot for the first pokemon game on a mainline console, that is enough I would think to be able to say someone's not "wrong" for being upset at that. Maybe it's a bit semantic but sometimes things are bad enough that I'm comfortable claiming someone isn't wrong for reacting in a bad way.

In any case, I wasn't talking about any particular game with my initial statement, I was coming up with a hypothetical where I'd be okay with it. It sounds like tennis and golf both did those things I listed, so I have no problem with them. It does not sound like SwSh did that, so I have a problem with them. Etc.

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I think Snap is definitely in its own tier here, Golf/Tennis just seem to be following the usual updates that sports games do and the compromise is that they launched without very many options (haven't played either, just going off of what I've heard). Snap's seems to be a legit substantial update to a game that was already far from lacking in content, I am very pleasantly surprised they put it out for free instead of getting some easy DLC bucks.

HeroDelTiempo17 posted...

Or Mario Party - launching without online multiplayer only to add it two and a half years later is just very weird. That one didn't seem planned though.

I imagine the reason for this is the new Mario Party coming out this year, they must've figured out how to do online and then decided to toss it on the old one.

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To be fair about Pokemon, there was nothing misleading there, either. They said there would be Pokemon missing, and gave a general number (X00+) of how many would be there. Other criticisms of the game lacking are also a bit more subjective. Like yeah, it does feel like the story is rushed at the end, but it's not like the DLC actually expands on that part, so it's tough to necessarily call it "unfinished." Likewise, it took major steps in other areas, like making this by far the most accessible gen when it comes to actual competitive battling.

The DLC itself is entirely new areas instead of adding anything "missing," and the Pokemon themselves are added in a free update to make it possible to trade for them, so you don't even have to buy the DLC to get that part of it.

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As someone who hated SwSh, I totally blame myself for buying it. Nintendo's communication about the content in that game was not the problem.

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i liked all of nintendo's free updates to mario 35

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See I knew and was fine with the fact it wouldnt have every Pokmon. I was not ok with the fact that after like the 4th gym you speed right through the rest of the game because it was so rushed feeling.

at least for Tennis, the content is too minor to justify coming back to the game for it. Like yeah, I would have enjoyed playing as this character, but one new character doesnt give you much to do.

Id prefer a larger dump of stuff all at once instead of frequent little bits , so its like oh hey, heres a bunch of stuff to check out.
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Splatoon 2 and ARMS got a lot of free updates and to some felt barebones at the beginning

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