That hit close to home, for me. It’s almost like, even your rig is magnitudes more powerful than Nintendo’s hardware, it doesn’t mean anything if the game devs can’t properly optimize for the hardware. Plus that is a path I tend to take whenever I invest in beastly hardware, I want to play AAA games at the highest settings, but then I remember graphics aren’t everything or that a good art style is more important than things like resolution and end up using my monster of a PC to play Pizza Tower all the time.
@@ConcavePgons Exactly. I have my doubts as to whether a monster PC is worth it for games that require monster PCs that don't yet exist to work, but it's great for 3D rendering and other things that are trivial for computers to do at this point, like checking e-mail and typing spreadsheets! Of course, it probably helps that computer software is specifically optimized for, well, computers. There is no need to release a Switch or PS5 version of ZBrush, for instance.
You know, I never really thought about that, but it's totally true. When I was a kid, almost everyone around me who had any interest in games at all, had a fair bit of overlap in what they liked. Nowadays, I look at my current circle of friends, my Discord pals and witness a wild variety of more specific interests in games, even if we did largely come together based on one or a couple of more central shared interest. This is, of course, entirely anecdotal for my part, but it just makes sense when it's laid out like this.
One thing to account for-depending on how long ago you were a kid-is the amount of choice (or lack thereof) you had back then. Gen Alpha has always had digital downloads as an option. When console games were only available on physical media, it was difficult for small developers to have their games published. So there were naturally fewer games to play, and more likely that kids would be playing the same games. On top of that, it used to be harder to offer a version for every platform because of the wildly different architectures, so even if a smaller developer did get their game published it was unlikely for them to offer multiple versions.
@@bubbledoubletrouble That's a really good point, actually, I hadn't considered it much. I grew up with GBA and Gamecube, so what you're mentioning here definitely applies, I think. That was well before the point where games started to become so much more widely available, and through such diverse media.
@@GamerTowerDX I never really thought of it that way but I suppose it makes sense. I figured those were just for hardcore fans, whether they were digital or physical buyers.
The popularity of many of these Nintendo games is boosted by them also being enjoyable for "older" players to play along with kids, as well as a kind of nostalgia for the kinds of games we played when we were their age. Games that brought you together in person with your friends and family ( and now online) like Wii Sports, Smash Bros, Mario Kart, etc.
That's 100% correct, at least for me. While Yakuza is my favorite gaming franchise, Pokemon is number 2. And I still love Nintendo other franchises; Zelda, Metroid, Kirby, Mario, etc. (Of course Xenoblade, Fire Emblem, and Bayonetta as well, but they are aimed for older players.
Then how in the f--- are Pokemon games selling well? They're not enjoyable by older players (buggy af), have no nostalgia (dexit), don't bring anyone together (godawful online), and sometimes they straight up insult the player (SV having no building interiors when Green did)
@@milesfarber pokémon is literally the largest media franchise in the world, and has been huge for a longe time. Dexit is about a vocal minority, and pokémon absolutely still commands massive nostalgia. Bugs are a thing the more "hardcore" and focused players care about more then most people, and also are not by themselves a reason older players can't like a game (I mean, bethesda exists) - same idea with other insulting things gamefreak does: they matter a lot more to a smaller portion of the fanbase. That smaller portion of the fanbase is also the most dedicated, so at least mid-term even though they get mad more, they also care more for the series. There are also always upsides, or things which are perceived as such. And, finally, as for kids: they don't care about bugs and have much less reference about missing features, yet they have been exposed to pokémon from birth - by the time they actually can properly play the games, they're already fans (not to mention lapsed gamer parents might just buy it to them without following the latest happenings). Don't get me wrong - to me gamefreak almost looks like they *want* to tank the games, but that's actually a very hard thing to do all things considered : p
yeah Nintendo's been around long enough that their big series are not only popular with young people but also adults who grew up with them and still enjoy them to this day
I've seen this with my youngest nephew. He's about 5 and he started off with stuff like roblox, mine craft, and now he's diversifying into more "traditional" games...he loves 8/16 bit mario right now
Can't wait for the sequel to the series, such an underrated gem among many of the games out there. Happy Life is such a great game, I spent like 20 hours on the fishing minigame alone
This kind of also applies to videogames as a whole too: in their infancy they had much less variation, but slowly more and more genres were born and refined and split apart. These two things may interact as well.
This is such a good explanation, not just for games but for various other media too! Mr Sakurai's work ethic videos are so good not just for games but in any field
It's always nice to have many, different opinions and preferences on what kind of games we enjoy. Depending on what KIND of game we wanna make, it'll be important to know your target audience and what they'd want in your game.
I gotta say, as someone who was born around the time games made the jump to 3D, all I ever played back then were platformers and rpgs in those times and I still do to an extent. But over time as I was reaching my teen years in 2006, I've been kinda branching out a lot playing stuff I never would've liked as a kid. I appreciate Sakurai for mentioning different poeple having different ways to play games. No one should be judged on how they approach a game for the first time. Much love!!!
A big reason for classic Nintendo games' appeal to youth is their emphasis on brisk and varied, yet still manageable, action adaptable to a variety of themes. Mario and Kirby are acrobatic obstacle course platformers in whimsical wonderlands, Zelda focuses on exploration, puzzle solving and resource management in a medieval fantasy world, and Metroid mixes the two approaches in unnerving extraterrestrial environments, all with very similar fundamental play feel. The just-right energy of how those games flow easily maintains the attention of those eager to find what this video game thing can do to delight them. Many classics, not just Nintendo ones, have a similar energy.
And, while you may want to focus on one branch, be careful to not go too far into it that your audience, as passionate as they can be to your game, is so small that it cannot make profit over the costs.
Another angle is that of player types, or providing things to do for players who play games differently. Nintendo games leave a lot of room for self-imposed challenges for challenge-loving gamers, and have a lot of optional content for exploration-focused gamers. This isn't to say that non-Nintendo games don't offer that too, but putting secondary mechanics in your game that target some of the branches of this tree metaphor can help tap into the more hardcore-focused older generation as well. It's just especially notable with Nintendo given how popular their games are with challenge runs or speedrunning.
@@TonyTheTGR Music is even more limited because it's only sound. Video uses image and sound. But games uses those plus control and interaction with other people or AI. But if you mean within it's own medium compared to others then music is probably more diverse than at least movies.
Can't say I agree with that. Art, Music, Movies, Books, all have at least the same level of diversity as video games do, but I'd argue they have more since they're older.
Thanks for the tip Mr Sakurai! I didn't realize this until I get old enough to see and understand the different tastes and types players have in the world. I prefer to target niche myself but not sure of their taste there so might need to study more.
Another awesome video by Sakurai! While it's true that the trunk would be the broadest audience, Sakurai makes a point that you could target a specific branch as well and be successful; you just need to be mindful of your target audience. Take Undertale, for example. I would say that's a game tailored for that hardcore niche market and it became massively successful thanks to the passion of the target audience.
So this video talked about branching tastes as an individual (either as developer or player). Another topic that I'm interested in that's also a little related is: "how diverse should a game's content be?" For example many games (especially well-funded big titles) tried to include content or feature across multiple genre into themselves, like Action RPG game that tried to implement creature collectathon etc. I wonder what opinion Mr Sakurai might have on this phenomena.
I think games that are aimed at appealing to a broad audience but that don't go out of their way to alienate niche audiences generally are quite popular, especially if there's multiple ways to express yourself in how you play. I feel like indie (and some major) companies will make a great game but occasionally get over zealous in making sure you play it the 'right' way and sap all the fun out of the experience as they correct that, or they'll revise gameplay mechanics/abilities/weapons into something more generic because that's what the majority of their player base prefers, and leave themselves with a product that now has a much narrower audience.
I like how Sakurai effectively singles out Pizza Tower, where the base of the tree, the root, is the Mario Land games and it's spinoff, Wario Land. Peppino very much owes his existence to Super Mario Bros. on the NES as that enthusiasm was passed down from one game developer to the next.
I just watch these videos because they're interesting but I think the tree analogy is really good philosophically. I feel like it could also represent neuroplasticity. If the end of my interests are at the ends of a branch on a tree, to learn something completely different means that most of the knowledge from the branch won't help and is unrelated. The stub of the branch, near the trunk is the vague foundational knowledge that might help learning the new thing. Like if you try to explain a difficult concept using niche terms (branch end), a layman won't really understand so you simplify it and target the trunk so anyone can understand it. I do think Nintendo games have broad appeal but I like how there might be bonus optional content for the minority to mess around with like post game levels, speedrun shortcuts, or highly variable interactions like the physics in Zelda BotW/TotK.
Another reason Nintendo did so well in the Wii Era was because they tapped into the broader audience of casual gamers. At the time, this was a wide-open market, a “Blue Ocean” (compared to the heavy competition between Sony and Microsoft to court Hardcore gamers, making it a “Red Ocean”).
I wonder how well this meshes wish the idea of an IP's brand recognition. That is, whether the tree-and-branch analogy works well when looking at a specific franchise, and whether it works well over time. After all, we live in a unique era where some of us _were kids_ when the idea of home consoles started being released. A Zelda game then is not the same as a Zelda game now, in terms of the marketing or even genre, for example.
As someone whose personal "Top Ten Games Of ALL TIME!!!!" list is just the Ace Attorney series, I'm really glad Sakurai ended this off with an acknowledgement that more niche products can be worth it through force of fandom devotion.
As far as I know, the reason why Nintendo sells well in Japan is because the Japanese people prefers portable consoles and because Japanese customers somehow marry to brands, that being the reason why foreign companies tend to sell almost nothing (Xbox not selling over 20 units in a month... Wow) But this is what I know from English and Spanish videos explaining the topic, I would like to see actual Japanese people confirming or disconfirming this info.
If it was just portability and brand loyalty then PS Vita should've done a lot better yet it didn't sell even a third of what PSP did and less than PS3 or PS4 even. The key is still software. Nintendo made a new fresh million seller IP on the freaking Wii U (Splatoon) that growed into multimilion category on the Switch. When was the last time third parties or Sony themselves did the same?
I would say that's one of the reasons why FF14 is one of the most successful MMORPGs. Unlike most MMORPGs where you're forced to grind and play the way the developpers intended, FF14 instead offers options for all kinds of people. Some people like to focus on hardcore fights, some people like to focus on professions, some people enjoy the lore, some people like doing community stuff... and there's plenty of options for all of these to keep players busy. Meanwhile, I'm a completionist and trying to collect and complete everything the game has to offer... I'm still not seeing the end :')
The reason I would aim my game at the Niche market of people who just really love dragons and gryphons is because they have been underfed as of late. They get so few that they would be desperate to actively search for and try out any game that allows you to play as a dragon or a gryphon. But in order to keep the players engaged and have more recommend it, I'd have to make the gameplay fluid and do both the dragon and the gryphon justice. The freeflow combat system from Batman Arkham could work for a dragon and gryphon game if you set the games world up just right and made your own tweaks and themes to the system to make it match the playable characters. And in my opinion, we can not get enough of the freeflow combat system.
Video games with anime graphics tend to sell well since not everything needs to be realistic. Logic needs to make sense in the world that was built. The gameplay also needs to be fun.
Hmm more or less my taste have been the same...more or less, but I understand not everyone is like this but this does (at least to me) prove that gamers DO know what they want but the trunk and branch Theory still applies when you want to make a game for a specific audience while still keeping the general public in mind.
I definitely was the little boy who mostly stuck by Nintendo for that childlike wonder. But yeah, overtime, you (hopefully, anyway) start to wonder what else is out there that isn't quite in your ballpark. And now I have a PS4 and have slowly been playing more diverse types of games that I never would've considered. Heck, if it wasn't for Smash Bros., I'd probably just be a Mario man for the rest of my life. That overlap between what you're familiar with and what's new really helps.
A lot of truths in this video, but here is a thought of mine: is the trunk always the same? In my country of France, a country in which a video game market grew very early, I assume a lot of players started out with educational video games which were EVERYWHERE in the market. Games like Adi & Adibou, the Rayman Edugames, the RMN/Cryo collabs like Versailles, those were the types of games our parents were more willing to buy than a Mario or a Zelda. Despite this, I assume games from American and Japanese studios still were able to sell thanks to schoolyards: the YuGiOh and Pokémon crazes also reached French schools despite the hold of edugames. I am also wondering how much of the trunk is taken by licensed games, bought because parents recognised the brand and because they were aimed at kids. And then, there's Humongous Entertainment, which I find interesting because you have a group of kids knowing them and another who doesn't; how much do they fit in the trunk and what part of this broad market were they able to catch? Unless they were a very early branch? Thank you for this interesting video, Mr. Sakurai!
Different trees in the same forest, I suppose. Consider how popular SNK games were in Latin America compared to other regions around the turn of the millennium, for example.
I started with Nintendo. Today I'm still a console gamer. Most of what I play are single-player titles with a bit of competitive multiplayer time going into Smash Bros. or mobile experiences like Fire Emblem Heroes.
I think nowadays there are also cases where genres that are initially niche become mainstream successes due to the community and social media exposure. Souls games for example are prime example of a niche series, but due to their consistency in quality and the passionate community, games like Elden Ring are able to experience massive sales. Another example I think is Monster Hunter World exploding in the West So devs catering to a small niche no other devs have touched upon can sometimes benefit as well
A certain executive of a certain brand that I will not mention, let's call this brand Bigsoft, which produces a product that we will call Ybox could learn a lot from these Sakurai videos.
So the "trunk" is the so-called "collective unconscious", right? For how much sales aren't the definitive indicator of quality, the massive sellers do seem to tap into what most of the world unconsciously agrees to be good in the end.
Yeah but that's kind of the point, isn't it? Aside from the Gamecube, Nintendo has never cared about being technologically cutting edge or ahead of the competition. They care about quality, and it shows.
Lol remember im playing vice city at 3 years old. 😂 The only games I didn't like as a kid were turn based, despite loving pokemon and FF aesthetics (FFX my fav)
"some people continue to buy physical versions of console games" i mean the consoles dont have unlimited storage space. and it helps avoid DRM, and if the digital version is scrubbed from existence, you still have the physical version to play. so in the end i guess im saying "what did Sakurai even mean by this???" i honestly dont see what it had to do with: 1. keeping an eye on the market to know what to aim for for the game you are making. or 2. what it has to do with having different tastes in games. it really feels like it has nothing to to with the rest of the subject matter.
I think i'm fine with letting the game be where it is, since the amount of people who play this specific genre (Fighting games) is niche anyway. Even if not a lot is there, at least the team made something cohesive. But maybe I'm just too complacent.
this is more in the pre-planing stage where you determine your market and go from there, as unless your a indie studio who produces games alongside a 9-5 you want a somewhat broader appeal to more people except hidden gem finders in that niche (basically trying to get the most people to buy your game while still being niche enough to land on a branch)
Yeah, you might want to bough out after that one. It isn't that you made a point any worse than I wood, but it was pretty sappy. That's the root of the problem. ...I'll let myself out.
There is a bunch of youtubers complaining about triple a games and while most of them deserve it especially multi-player based games like halo infinite or battlefield there's tons of indie games in various different genre's many of them being good and cheap not to mention all the old games easily emulateable which isn't actually illegal why are you playing triple games you don't like when they're so many good to amazing games playable
I think I have to disagree with this video, because a niche can still be appealing to a lot of people. And going for the "mainstream market" can really water down what makes your game fun in the first place. I mean you should be aware of your target audience, but you shouldn't throw away the uniqueness of the game itself. There are also games of unknown genres, let's say Minecraft it's the most sold video game of all time, but it started in a niche of block games, which nearly no one even knew about at the time. There were also genre which were thought to be dead and bloomed again, like with Doom 2016 and the second rise of the boomer shooter. Or let's say Elden Ring a Dark Souls like, judging by the genre it should have been a failure or maybe be a hidden gem kind of game, but it was a huge success. Or let's take animal crossing, it was quite a small game, but the last installment was a huge success, even though the genre is quite niche. I just think that mass appeal and how much of a niche or branch your game is in not necessary correlate.
BUt I think that's what he meant for viewing the market "top-down". You don't target one specific branch directly, but rather understand the whole picture so you can start from a point and try to fit other branches and the broader market as you shape your product.
Shooters and Life Simulators were still HUGE by the time Doom and Animal Crossing came out, they just did their own unique twists on the genre that let to new branches on the tree.
Funny how this video is talking about people having such a wide variety of tastes and preferences yet Sakurai never considered that Smash bros would introduce people to Xenoblade, Final Fantasy 7, or even Fire Emblem as he blatantly spoils those games both in game and in trailers.
Honestly, I think a bigger factor in "Branching Tastes" is just how much more variety there are in terms of what to play. It's like how, in the USA at least, most people growing up before the age of the Internet has similar frames of reference in terms of what was on TV at the time. Things are so much more diverse now, which is not to say there wasn't any kind of diverse TV back in the day, but a lot of it was fairly homogeneous. Still, there IS something to the idea that people grow up and sometimes "grow out" of some things, like how most adults nowadays used to watch cartoons, but now only people who are truly hardcore fans of cartoons still care about them, or even make cartoons themselves.
Sony used to understand this but now they're way overly focused on the hardcore (but kinda naive, wanna be "mature") gamer branch. Remember Jak, Hot Shots, Parappa, Team Ico, Spyro, Patapon, LittleBigPlanet, etc? All pretty much gone now. PS5 has 1 Ratchet title, but in the past there might be 2-3 by now. The included robot game was good, but also sort of a generic Playstation ad. Sony gave up their valuable 'trunk IP's' and let them rot and wither, and I think that was a huge mistake. I was a 2:1 Playstation to Nintendo consumer in the PS1-PS3 days. Today its like 1:5. I'm just not into these brutal 3rd person action narrative games that is practically all their big games these days. I'm not on that branch.
It is important to know that not everything is going to be for everybody as not everybody does the same. Japanese video games should stay as Japanese video games. Uncensored and translated content do sell.
It depends. The moral/ethical aspect you may perceive there is rather outside of the scope of the topic here, I think. But if we're looking at just the commercial performance of the product, which is what the video focuses on, it will likely depend greatly on your target audience. If you're targeting one of the tips of the branches, going by Mr. Sakurai's example, it may make sense to stick as close to the original product as possible when bringing your game to other parts of the world, even if it wouldn't make sense to the average person, because your target audience - which is more invested in your specific niche - will more likely understand and appreciate the content and intent of the original product. Taking liberties in localisation could even risk alienating the people you're trying to cater to. Note also that this is a lot easier to do for a small, niche game, given that the potential audience, and therefore potential returns, are inherently relatively small. If you're going for the trunk, though? A broader, more general audience may not resonate with aspects of your game or even clash with it directly, and much of the original language's jokes or wordplay might not make sense when taken literally. Especially if your product hinges heavily on understanding the culture of the game's origin, putting strict restrictions on localisation is likely also limiting your game's potential reach. I'm no developer myself, and obviously much of this depends on the kind of game you're making, but while I think "Japanese video games should stay as Japanese video games." is an admirable ideal on paper, to accept it as an absolute to apply in every situation rather misses the forest for the trees. As a developer, chances are you're making concessions to uphold it.
![Bug Testing Never Ends [Team Management]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/yIXB0vGJBuw/mqdefault.jpg)
![Bug Testing Never Ends [Team Management]](/img/tr.png)
![How I Stuck With My Column [Work Ethic]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/ff7HadWHTJo/mqdefault.jpg)
sakurai calling out big PC builds that only run indie games is one of the funniest developments on this channel
Sakurai being relatable
so casually too, like, matter-of-fact
That hit close to home, for me. It’s almost like, even your rig is magnitudes more powerful than Nintendo’s hardware, it doesn’t mean anything if the game devs can’t properly optimize for the hardware.
Plus that is a path I tend to take whenever I invest in beastly hardware, I want to play AAA games at the highest settings, but then I remember graphics aren’t everything or that a good art style is more important than things like resolution and end up using my monster of a PC to play Pizza Tower all the time.
@@JeffreyThrash At least with a monster PC you can do everything else with ease!
@@ConcavePgons Exactly. I have my doubts as to whether a monster PC is worth it for games that require monster PCs that don't yet exist to work, but it's great for 3D rendering and other things that are trivial for computers to do at this point, like checking e-mail and typing spreadsheets!
Of course, it probably helps that computer software is specifically optimized for, well, computers. There is no need to release a Switch or PS5 version of ZBrush, for instance.
You know, I never really thought about that, but it's totally true. When I was a kid, almost everyone around me who had any interest in games at all, had a fair bit of overlap in what they liked. Nowadays, I look at my current circle of friends, my Discord pals and witness a wild variety of more specific interests in games, even if we did largely come together based on one or a couple of more central shared interest. This is, of course, entirely anecdotal for my part, but it just makes sense when it's laid out like this.
One thing to account for-depending on how long ago you were a kid-is the amount of choice (or lack thereof) you had back then. Gen Alpha has always had digital downloads as an option. When console games were only available on physical media, it was difficult for small developers to have their games published. So there were naturally fewer games to play, and more likely that kids would be playing the same games. On top of that, it used to be harder to offer a version for every platform because of the wildly different architectures, so even if a smaller developer did get their game published it was unlikely for them to offer multiple versions.
@@bubbledoubletrouble That's a really good point, actually, I hadn't considered it much. I grew up with GBA and Gamecube, so what you're mentioning here definitely applies, I think. That was well before the point where games started to become so much more widely available, and through such diverse media.
I like how he singles out physical game collectors as if we're a different breed of people
I mean that is the audience Collector Editions are hunting for right?
@@GamerTowerDX I never really thought of it that way but I suppose it makes sense. I figured those were just for hardcore fans, whether they were digital or physical buyers.
us physical media people are truly built different
Objectively speaking, we kind of are.
@@fearingalma1550 truly
The popularity of many of these Nintendo games is boosted by them also being enjoyable for "older" players to play along with kids, as well as a kind of nostalgia for the kinds of games we played when we were their age. Games that brought you together in person with your friends and family ( and now online) like Wii Sports, Smash Bros, Mario Kart, etc.
That's 100% correct, at least for me. While Yakuza is my favorite gaming franchise, Pokemon is number 2. And I still love Nintendo other franchises; Zelda, Metroid, Kirby, Mario, etc. (Of course Xenoblade, Fire Emblem, and Bayonetta as well, but they are aimed for older players.
Switch sports is really bad though, i think the sports franchise is dead now, unless the music and yt videos keep it alive, idk
Then how in the f--- are Pokemon games selling well? They're not enjoyable by older players (buggy af), have no nostalgia (dexit), don't bring anyone together (godawful online), and sometimes they straight up insult the player (SV having no building interiors when Green did)
@@milesfarber pokémon is literally the largest media franchise in the world, and has been huge for a longe time. Dexit is about a vocal minority, and pokémon absolutely still commands massive nostalgia. Bugs are a thing the more "hardcore" and focused players care about more then most people, and also are not by themselves a reason older players can't like a game (I mean, bethesda exists) - same idea with other insulting things gamefreak does: they matter a lot more to a smaller portion of the fanbase. That smaller portion of the fanbase is also the most dedicated, so at least mid-term even though they get mad more, they also care more for the series. There are also always upsides, or things which are perceived as such.
And, finally, as for kids: they don't care about bugs and have much less reference about missing features, yet they have been exposed to pokémon from birth - by the time they actually can properly play the games, they're already fans (not to mention lapsed gamer parents might just buy it to them without following the latest happenings).
Don't get me wrong - to me gamefreak almost looks like they *want* to tank the games, but that's actually a very hard thing to do all things considered : p
yeah Nintendo's been around long enough that their big series are not only popular with young people but also adults who grew up with them and still enjoy them to this day
I've seen this with my youngest nephew. He's about 5 and he started off with stuff like roblox, mine craft, and now he's diversifying into more "traditional" games...he loves 8/16 bit mario right now
Parenting done right.
@@RangoTheMercenary uncle-ing...😅 i make suyre he knows where the real fun stuff is...haha.
I'm gonna try to get my five year old niece into video games. Gonna start her with Untitled Goose Game
thank you for this comment, CunninLynguist
@@BJGvideos Let us know if she starts honking at her parents and biting things to move them around.
Loving the little reappearances of Happy Life!
Especially after it got canceled last video. Good to see it got picked up again
Can't wait for the sequel to the series, such an underrated gem among many of the games out there. Happy Life is such a great game, I spent like 20 hours on the fishing minigame alone
The spiritual successor of Kirby Air Ride.
This kind of also applies to videogames as a whole too: in their infancy they had much less variation, but slowly more and more genres were born and refined and split apart. These two things may interact as well.
Interesting… it’s not necessarily about aiming for the trunk, but understanding where along the tree you’re aiming for and where your game fits.
I agree actually😮
This is such a good explanation, not just for games but for various other media too! Mr Sakurai's work ethic videos are so good not just for games but in any field
It's always nice to have many, different opinions and preferences on what kind of games we enjoy. Depending on what KIND of game we wanna make, it'll be important to know your target audience and what they'd want in your game.
When we get from diverse gaming to the big tree of life in some minutes
I gotta say, as someone who was born around the time games made the jump to 3D, all I ever played back then were platformers and rpgs in those times and I still do to an extent. But over time as I was reaching my teen years in 2006, I've been kinda branching out a lot playing stuff I never would've liked as a kid. I appreciate Sakurai for mentioning different poeple having different ways to play games. No one should be judged on how they approach a game for the first time. Much love!!!
Back in those days, a plurality of games were platformers, so that's no surprise.
Imagine having a 3 monitor setup just to play indie games
Omg. That's just like me frfr
Back in 2015, that was /v/ in a nutshell, idk now
Must be one of those hardcore speedrunners, got the doc guide/notes on one monitor, got the timer on the top, and the game in the center
@@ScoutBostonAnonStuds Need a 4th for chat if they’re streaming
Me playing Stardew Valley with my 4090
"Zatsudan, Zatsudan, Zatsudan desu"
I love it when Sakurai-san said that
Timestamp?
A big reason for classic Nintendo games' appeal to youth is their emphasis on brisk and varied, yet still manageable, action adaptable to a variety of themes. Mario and Kirby are acrobatic obstacle course platformers in whimsical wonderlands, Zelda focuses on exploration, puzzle solving and resource management in a medieval fantasy world, and Metroid mixes the two approaches in unnerving extraterrestrial environments, all with very similar fundamental play feel. The just-right energy of how those games flow easily maintains the attention of those eager to find what this video game thing can do to delight them. Many classics, not just Nintendo ones, have a similar energy.
Sakurai's videos are allways brilliant and straight to the point!
I do like thinking about this with fighting games, those target a very specific branch of people
And, while you may want to focus on one branch, be careful to not go too far into it that your audience, as passionate as they can be to your game, is so small that it cannot make profit over the costs.
im so proud of happy life getting a second chance after being cancled.
I agree, Nintendo does consistently market to a general family audience.
That's why I love them.
This made me rethink my perspective on life, not just video games.
Another angle is that of player types, or providing things to do for players who play games differently. Nintendo games leave a lot of room for self-imposed challenges for challenge-loving gamers, and have a lot of optional content for exploration-focused gamers. This isn't to say that non-Nintendo games don't offer that too, but putting secondary mechanics in your game that target some of the branches of this tree metaphor can help tap into the more hardcore-focused older generation as well. It's just especially notable with Nintendo given how popular their games are with challenge runs or speedrunning.
There is no more diverse medium created by humans than video games.
That's because games offer many forms of art and interaction simultaneously unlike any other form of entertainment
Music is very close
@@TonyTheTGR Music is even more limited because it's only sound. Video uses image and sound. But games uses those plus control and interaction with other people or AI. But if you mean within it's own medium compared to others then music is probably more diverse than at least movies.
Can't say I agree with that. Art, Music, Movies, Books, all have at least the same level of diversity as video games do, but I'd argue they have more since they're older.
Wow, you've reminded me the different ways I've enjoyed games throughout the years.
Thanks for the tip Mr Sakurai! I didn't realize this until I get old enough to see and understand the different tastes and types players have in the world. I prefer to target niche myself but not sure of their taste there so might need to study more.
Even those who play similar games can end up being wildly different in tastes.
amazing advice. thank you sakurai! will remember this as well.
Its always good feeling when Sakurai uploading New video, these game creator tutorial videos are helpful For me WHO Want make own game. 🎮🖥️
Another awesome video by Sakurai! While it's true that the trunk would be the broadest audience, Sakurai makes a point that you could target a specific branch as well and be successful; you just need to be mindful of your target audience. Take Undertale, for example. I would say that's a game tailored for that hardcore niche market and it became massively successful thanks to the passion of the target audience.
this video is super informative, the tree analogy is clever.
So this video talked about branching tastes as an individual (either as developer or player). Another topic that I'm interested in that's also a little related is: "how diverse should a game's content be?" For example many games (especially well-funded big titles) tried to include content or feature across multiple genre into themselves, like Action RPG game that tried to implement creature collectathon etc. I wonder what opinion Mr Sakurai might have on this phenomena.
I think games that are aimed at appealing to a broad audience but that don't go out of their way to alienate niche audiences generally are quite popular, especially if there's multiple ways to express yourself in how you play. I feel like indie (and some major) companies will make a great game but occasionally get over zealous in making sure you play it the 'right' way and sap all the fun out of the experience as they correct that, or they'll revise gameplay mechanics/abilities/weapons into something more generic because that's what the majority of their player base prefers, and leave themselves with a product that now has a much narrower audience.
I like how Sakurai effectively singles out Pizza Tower, where the base of the tree, the root, is the Mario Land games and it's spinoff, Wario Land. Peppino very much owes his existence to Super Mario Bros. on the NES as that enthusiasm was passed down from one game developer to the next.
I just watch these videos because they're interesting but I think the tree analogy is really good philosophically. I feel like it could also represent neuroplasticity. If the end of my interests are at the ends of a branch on a tree, to learn something completely different means that most of the knowledge from the branch won't help and is unrelated. The stub of the branch, near the trunk is the vague foundational knowledge that might help learning the new thing. Like if you try to explain a difficult concept using niche terms (branch end), a layman won't really understand so you simplify it and target the trunk so anyone can understand it.
I do think Nintendo games have broad appeal but I like how there might be bonus optional content for the minority to mess around with like post game levels, speedrun shortcuts, or highly variable interactions like the physics in Zelda BotW/TotK.
Another reason Nintendo did so well in the Wii Era was because they tapped into the broader audience of casual gamers. At the time, this was a wide-open market, a “Blue Ocean” (compared to the heavy competition between Sony and Microsoft to court Hardcore gamers, making it a “Red Ocean”).
The prophet hath spoken.
i like how the indie guy had the most complex pc setup
I wonder how well this meshes wish the idea of an IP's brand recognition. That is, whether the tree-and-branch analogy works well when looking at a specific franchise, and whether it works well over time.
After all, we live in a unique era where some of us _were kids_ when the idea of home consoles started being released. A Zelda game then is not the same as a Zelda game now, in terms of the marketing or even genre, for example.
As someone whose personal "Top Ten Games Of ALL TIME!!!!" list is just the Ace Attorney series, I'm really glad Sakurai ended this off with an acknowledgement that more niche products can be worth it through force of fandom devotion.
Not a bad metaphor. I've certainly never thought of it that way, but it makes a lot of sense.
(0:50) ‘Some focus on their PC and play only indie games’
(The example portrays someone with a multi-monitor setup)
I feel seen.
After watching Nathaniel Bandy's new video, now i have to check carefully which channels uploads a new video to avoid confusion
I like how he is Sakurai.
0:50 I like how the indie game player has the best set up :D
As far as I know, the reason why Nintendo sells well in Japan is because the Japanese people prefers portable consoles and because Japanese customers somehow marry to brands, that being the reason why foreign companies tend to sell almost nothing (Xbox not selling over 20 units in a month... Wow)
But this is what I know from English and Spanish videos explaining the topic, I would like to see actual Japanese people confirming or disconfirming this info.
If it was just portability and brand loyalty then PS Vita should've done a lot better yet it didn't sell even a third of what PSP did and less than PS3 or PS4 even. The key is still software. Nintendo made a new fresh million seller IP on the freaking Wii U (Splatoon) that growed into multimilion category on the Switch. When was the last time third parties or Sony themselves did the same?
0:50 oh ok Sakurai, thanks for calling me out like that!
did Sakurai just explain why Spongebob turned out ot be a huge success or am I crazy
I would say that's one of the reasons why FF14 is one of the most successful MMORPGs. Unlike most MMORPGs where you're forced to grind and play the way the developpers intended, FF14 instead offers options for all kinds of people. Some people like to focus on hardcore fights, some people like to focus on professions, some people enjoy the lore, some people like doing community stuff... and there's plenty of options for all of these to keep players busy. Meanwhile, I'm a completionist and trying to collect and complete everything the game has to offer... I'm still not seeing the end :')
I like how the person with 5 screens and the most expensive looking pc is using it to play indie games.
Accurate!
Very interesting argument
The reason I would aim my game at the Niche market of people who just really love dragons and gryphons is because they have been underfed as of late. They get so few that they would be desperate to actively search for and try out any game that allows you to play as a dragon or a gryphon. But in order to keep the players engaged and have more recommend it, I'd have to make the gameplay fluid and do both the dragon and the gryphon justice. The freeflow combat system from Batman Arkham could work for a dragon and gryphon game if you set the games world up just right and made your own tweaks and themes to the system to make it match the playable characters. And in my opinion, we can not get enough of the freeflow combat system.
This is why indie games are awesome.
I seem to really want to make some "games you would've found on Windows 98 and Windows XP".
This was such a anime backstory.
Masahiro Sakurai saying how videogames is more diverse then anything on TV.
It would be super cool to make a video explaining "Why Nintendo games sell.", please !
Video games with anime graphics tend to sell well since not everything needs to be realistic. Logic needs to make sense in the world that was built. The gameplay also needs to be fun.
It's good to see that in Japan youngsters play good games at least around here they all tend to play only minecraft and shooting games
Hmm more or less my taste have been the same...more or less, but I understand not everyone is like this but this does (at least to me) prove that gamers DO know what they want but the trunk and branch Theory still applies when you want to make a game for a specific audience while still keeping the general public in mind.
me and my friends in a nutshell. couldn't have explained it better.
I don't know if I'm hearing a "Ewok line" in the videogame environment but probably I'm wrong
Kids really love Metroid dread then
I definitely was the little boy who mostly stuck by Nintendo for that childlike wonder. But yeah, overtime, you (hopefully, anyway) start to wonder what else is out there that isn't quite in your ballpark. And now I have a PS4 and have slowly been playing more diverse types of games that I never would've considered. Heck, if it wasn't for Smash Bros., I'd probably just be a Mario man for the rest of my life. That overlap between what you're familiar with and what's new really helps.
A lot of truths in this video, but here is a thought of mine: is the trunk always the same?
In my country of France, a country in which a video game market grew very early, I assume a lot of players started out with educational video games which were EVERYWHERE in the market. Games like Adi & Adibou, the Rayman Edugames, the RMN/Cryo collabs like Versailles, those were the types of games our parents were more willing to buy than a Mario or a Zelda.
Despite this, I assume games from American and Japanese studios still were able to sell thanks to schoolyards: the YuGiOh and Pokémon crazes also reached French schools despite the hold of edugames.
I am also wondering how much of the trunk is taken by licensed games, bought because parents recognised the brand and because they were aimed at kids.
And then, there's Humongous Entertainment, which I find interesting because you have a group of kids knowing them and another who doesn't; how much do they fit in the trunk and what part of this broad market were they able to catch? Unless they were a very early branch?
Thank you for this interesting video, Mr. Sakurai!
Different trees in the same forest, I suppose. Consider how popular SNK games were in Latin America compared to other regions around the turn of the millennium, for example.
I started with Nintendo. Today I'm still a console gamer. Most of what I play are single-player titles with a bit of competitive multiplayer time going into Smash Bros. or mobile experiences like Fire Emblem Heroes.
Whoa!
do a video about arcades!
I think nowadays there are also cases where genres that are initially niche become mainstream successes due to the community and social media exposure.
Souls games for example are prime example of a niche series, but due to their consistency in quality and the passionate community, games like Elden Ring are able to experience massive sales. Another example I think is Monster Hunter World exploding in the West
So devs catering to a small niche no other devs have touched upon can sometimes benefit as well
Ahh Yes the The Gaming Tree of life
A certain executive of a certain brand that I will not mention, let's call this brand Bigsoft, which produces a product that we will call Ybox could learn a lot from these Sakurai videos.
So the "trunk" is the so-called "collective unconscious", right?
For how much sales aren't the definitive indicator of quality, the massive sellers do seem to tap into what most of the world unconsciously agrees to be good in the end.
This is gold
Sakurai: "But it's not like they use cutting-edge hardware or tech."
Me: "Truer words have never been spoken. 😂"
Yeah but that's kind of the point, isn't it? Aside from the Gamecube, Nintendo has never cared about being technologically cutting edge or ahead of the competition. They care about quality, and it shows.
Lol remember im playing vice city at 3 years old. 😂 The only games I didn't like as a kid were turn based, despite loving pokemon and FF aesthetics (FFX my fav)
This video just ended the Nintendo Switch 2 and Tears of the Kingdom graphics debate.
Thank you, Sakurai
Sakurai is a genius! Btw I'm the super indie gamer type.
Oh hey, the Black kid at 1:06 has a nice fade. Good to see you making progress, Sakurai. 👍🏾
I would find interesting to see a Pokemon fighting game on the molds of Smash Bros. It would fit like a glove. :)
Looking at the PS2/GameCube era, I wouldn't be to sure if I agreed to this video 🤔
YEAH IM HERE AT 6AM, LOVE YOU SAKURAI
"some people continue to buy physical versions of console games" i mean the consoles dont have unlimited storage space.
and it helps avoid DRM, and if the digital version is scrubbed from existence, you still have the physical version to play.
so in the end i guess im saying "what did Sakurai even mean by this???"
i honestly dont see what it had to do with: 1. keeping an eye on the market to know what to aim for for the game you are making.
or 2. what it has to do with having different tastes in games.
it really feels like it has nothing to to with the rest of the subject matter.
I think i'm fine with letting the game be where it is, since the amount of people who play this specific genre (Fighting games) is niche anyway.
Even if not a lot is there, at least the team made something cohesive.
But maybe I'm just too complacent.
this is more in the pre-planing stage where you determine your market and go from there, as unless your a indie studio who produces games alongside a 9-5 you want a somewhat broader appeal to more people except hidden gem finders in that niche (basically trying to get the most people to buy your game while still being niche enough to land on a branch)
@@R8Spikei'll think on this.
Branching tastes.
They taste sticky.
I'll let myself out.
No they are crispy
Yeah, you might want to bough out after that one. It isn't that you made a point any worse than I wood, but it was pretty sappy. That's the root of the problem.
...I'll let myself out.
Remember, you can never appeal to everyone
💖
There is a bunch of youtubers complaining about triple a games and while most of them deserve it especially multi-player based games like halo infinite or battlefield there's tons of indie games in various different genre's many of them being good and cheap not to mention all the old games easily emulateable which isn't actually illegal why are you playing triple games you don't like when they're so many good to amazing games playable
"Some focus on their PC and play only indie games"
yeeehhhh!
Okay Sakurai, when is Happy Life releasing?
And yet, people always expect developers to continue to cater to their individual tastes even as they get older and those tastes change.
its a bit jarring to hear a different track in one of these videos, i like this one though
I think I have to disagree with this video, because a niche can still be appealing to a lot of people.
And going for the "mainstream market" can really water down what makes your game fun in the first place.
I mean you should be aware of your target audience, but you shouldn't throw away the uniqueness of the game itself.
There are also games of unknown genres, let's say Minecraft it's the most sold video game of all time, but it started in a niche of block games, which nearly no one even knew about at the time.
There were also genre which were thought to be dead and bloomed again, like with Doom 2016 and the second rise of the boomer shooter.
Or let's say Elden Ring a Dark Souls like, judging by the genre it should have been a failure or maybe be a hidden gem kind of game, but it was a huge success.
Or let's take animal crossing, it was quite a small game, but the last installment was a huge success, even though the genre is quite niche.
I just think that mass appeal and how much of a niche or branch your game is in not necessary correlate.
BUt I think that's what he meant for viewing the market "top-down". You don't target one specific branch directly, but rather understand the whole picture so you can start from a point and try to fit other branches and the broader market as you shape your product.
Shooters and Life Simulators were still HUGE by the time Doom and Animal Crossing came out, they just did their own unique twists on the genre that let to new branches on the tree.
Funny how this video is talking about people having such a wide variety of tastes and preferences yet Sakurai never considered that Smash bros would introduce people to Xenoblade, Final Fantasy 7, or even Fire Emblem as he blatantly spoils those games both in game and in trailers.
Honestly, I think a bigger factor in "Branching Tastes" is just how much more variety there are in terms of what to play. It's like how, in the USA at least, most people growing up before the age of the Internet has similar frames of reference in terms of what was on TV at the time. Things are so much more diverse now, which is not to say there wasn't any kind of diverse TV back in the day, but a lot of it was fairly homogeneous.
Still, there IS something to the idea that people grow up and sometimes "grow out" of some things, like how most adults nowadays used to watch cartoons, but now only people who are truly hardcore fans of cartoons still care about them, or even make cartoons themselves.
Sony used to understand this but now they're way overly focused on the hardcore (but kinda naive, wanna be "mature") gamer branch. Remember Jak, Hot Shots, Parappa, Team Ico, Spyro, Patapon, LittleBigPlanet, etc? All pretty much gone now. PS5 has 1 Ratchet title, but in the past there might be 2-3 by now. The included robot game was good, but also sort of a generic Playstation ad. Sony gave up their valuable 'trunk IP's' and let them rot and wither, and I think that was a huge mistake. I was a 2:1 Playstation to Nintendo consumer in the PS1-PS3 days. Today its like 1:5. I'm just not into these brutal 3rd person action narrative games that is practically all their big games these days. I'm not on that branch.
I wish Patapon continued. It was so fun.
Basically, market research, do it
In short: "Know your audience."
Tag yourself,
I'm the one with 4 Ring Fit Adventure sessions per week and a low maintenance gacha on my phone.
2:00 It also helps that they're established IPs with each game backed by a multi milion dollar marketing campain. 😉
It is important to know that not everything is going to be for everybody as not everybody does the same. Japanese video games should stay as Japanese video games. Uncensored and translated content do sell.
I approve of this being framed in an anti censorship way lol.
It depends. The moral/ethical aspect you may perceive there is rather outside of the scope of the topic here, I think. But if we're looking at just the commercial performance of the product, which is what the video focuses on, it will likely depend greatly on your target audience. If you're targeting one of the tips of the branches, going by Mr. Sakurai's example, it may make sense to stick as close to the original product as possible when bringing your game to other parts of the world, even if it wouldn't make sense to the average person, because your target audience - which is more invested in your specific niche - will more likely understand and appreciate the content and intent of the original product. Taking liberties in localisation could even risk alienating the people you're trying to cater to. Note also that this is a lot easier to do for a small, niche game, given that the potential audience, and therefore potential returns, are inherently relatively small.
If you're going for the trunk, though? A broader, more general audience may not resonate with aspects of your game or even clash with it directly, and much of the original language's jokes or wordplay might not make sense when taken literally. Especially if your product hinges heavily on understanding the culture of the game's origin, putting strict restrictions on localisation is likely also limiting your game's potential reach.
I'm no developer myself, and obviously much of this depends on the kind of game you're making, but while I think "Japanese video games should stay as Japanese video games." is an admirable ideal on paper, to accept it as an absolute to apply in every situation rather misses the forest for the trees. As a developer, chances are you're making concessions to uphold it.
...or it's because Nintendo games have absurd amounts of brand recognizability?