The Eight Eras of Nintendo

[mrmolecule]

The more I researched, the more I found that despite five consoles, there about eight distinct Nintendo eras.

The Post-Atari Era (1985-1988)
The first era was before the NES ever got big. This was following the crash, and ROB, not Mario, was the flagship of the NES.

The Golden Age (1988-1992)
This is when the NES ruled, and Nintendo Power got its start.

The Play It Loud Era (1992-1996)
The PIL era was on the SNES (edit: and Game Boy). 1990s marketing pitted it against Sega's own ads.

The 64 Era (1996-1998)
At a time when the 64DD was still plausible, it was "64" this, "64" that. This was the way Nintendo fought against the Saturn and the PlayStation. That and speedier cartridges.

The Era of Pokémon (1999-2002)
As the N64 proved to languish, Nintendo found its next star. The GBA and the GCN were introduced at this time. It was also at this point where I became a Nintendo fanboy.

The Dork Age (2003-2005)
This is the peak of the GameCube era. Nintendo Power was more of an advertisement for Nintendo than ever. Weak games, bizarre marketing (remember the e-Reader? "Who are You?", "Classic NES Series") and overshadowed sales were the products of the Dork Age. Coincidentally, this fell almost directly in the time I went to junior high.

The Era of Hope (2005-2007)
A new realistic Zelda game at E3, a redesigned Nintendo Power, a sleek console in the works, and the new Nintendo DS was hope that Nintendo would come out the pits of the Dork Age and come back to life.

The Wii Era (2007-present)
The Wii era was marked by totally new marketing (albeit successful) and new games to still remind us that it was cool to be into Nintendo.

And so that's it. I had debated about the eras (I did put some thought into it). I had considered "The ROB Era" for the first, for the Dork Age, I thought about the "Who Are You Era". For the early 2000s, I considered the "Advanced Era", but it was too short.

[Johans Nidorino]

I thought "Play it Loud" was more associated with the Game Boy. Give it some credit!

[The Qu]

Ha! Speaking of Play It Loud, I recently had one of my old posters- an SNES era Play It Loud poster- framed. It's an awesome poster.

I would add three proto eras- the Proto Era (1888-197X), the Early Arcade/Home Games era (197x-1980) and the Arcade Era (1980-1985). But these are from before Nintendo became Nintendo, so to speak.

[kirbychu]

Weak games? On the Gamecube? I own more games for that console than anything else, and it's home to a pretty large number of my favourites...

[mrmolecule]

@ Johans: You're right. I should have put Game Boy on there.
@ The Qu: Yes, I could've put additional eras, like The Hanafuda Era (1888-1950s), the Post-War Era (1950s-1960s), the Diversification Era (1963-1966), the Toy Era (1966-1973), the Light Gun Era (1973-1980), and the Arcade Era (1980-1985), but those are longer and less defined than the modern eras.
@ kirbychu: "Weak" does not mean "bad". There were a number of good games released in the "Dork Age", including Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door and Viewtiful Joe, but they were overshadowed by shovelware titles and bigger titles on the PS2 and Xbox. Paper Mario 2 was unfortunately timed the day Halo 2 hit shelves, for instance. I also remember reading back in 2004 or so that another video game depression was possible. It really wasn't a great time.

[The Qu]

I have to agree that the Gamecube had a tough life after the initial gleam wore off. However, I think Dork Age is the wrong title for it. Dork Age makes it sounds like it's a much deeper problem rooted with Nintendo itself, similar to the dork ages of Marvel and DC Comics rather than being caused by competition with more successful companies and inferior hardware. Not sure what a better name would be, though.

This would be an interesting article for the Database itself.

[kirbychu]

I thought the Gamecube had far less shovelware than the PS2 did... In fact, I'm having a hard time thinking of a single shovelware title on the Gamecube.

All I know is, the Gamecube was the only console that I never had trouble finding a great game to buy for. Most of the games on the shelves were fantastic. But that's mostly because there wasn't any profit in developers flooding the Gamecube market with cheap minigame compilations, unlike the PS2 (or now, the Wii).

[TV Eye]

To me, the Gamecube had fantastic games, there just weren't enough to go around. Though, I never owned one, and am only now getting into Gamecube games on account of the Wii's backwards compatibility.

[mrmolecule]

Maybe "shovelware" is not the right term for it...but the GameCube received a lot of mediocre multi-platform ports, like Dr. Muto, Ty the Tasmanian Tiger, and more.

Also, even the flagship titles of the GCN were overlooked, and belittled. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker was a great game and corrected much of the problems of Ocarina of Time, however, Wind Waker had its own set of problems. It was rushed and had to get a few dungeons cut out for a boring fetch quest. Meanwhile, Super Mario Sunshine really wasn't a decent sequel to Super Mario 64. And all this time, the PS2 and Xbox were out-selling the GameCube, Nintendo was promoting the e-Reader (which was expensive and took two systems if you wanted to use it to add on to other games), the Game Boy Player, the Classic NES series, and more. All at the same time, the official magazine was a fairly cluttered mess "arrogantly propagandizing" (to quote the words of member Nester) Nintendo. I remember that they listed reasons why the Nintendo was better than the competitors, even going to such extremes like "It's good that it doesn't play DVDs because it will get tied up with bad movies" or "The PS2 controller has way too many buttons". It was a dark time to be a Nintendo fan.

[Wildcat]

I have a lot to add about the Gamecube, but it'll have to wait until I'm not at work.

[mrmolecule]

The Era of Hope was a pivotal time in Nintendo. It had a lot of the early DS titles come out of it, and had some amazing moments, like Resident Evil 4. Unfortunately, a lot of games were overshadowed by the looming death of the GameCube (like Chibi-Robo! and Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix), and the Internet had doubt about the "Blue Ocean" strategy of Nintendo...it seemed like Nintendo really needed to hit one out of the ballpark if they wanted to survive the seventh generation.

The "Dork Age" probably wasn't nearly as bad as I may have put it, and it's not to say no good games came out of it, but let's face it...the Dork Age was where the GameCube unraveled.

[kirbychu]

Aug 12, 2010 12:21:09 GMT -5 mrmolecule said:

Meanwhile, Super Mario Sunshine really wasn't a decent sequel to Super Mario 64.

I disagree.

Also, Wind Waker is my overall favourite entry in the Zelda series. (Majora's Mask is up there too, but Wind Waker wins out by being fucking beautiful).

I don't know about the e-Reader or Nintendo Power. We never got those things here. But... Classic NES Series was a bad thing now?

[Koopaul]

I certainly started hating Nintendo Power at that time and I still do. Their constant mockery of DKC pissed me off.

As for the Gamecube era I hate to say this but I enjoyed it much more than I am with the Wii era. Wait why? My library of course! It is four times the size of what I currently have of Wii games.

[mrmolecule]

@ kirbychu: Classic NES Series was a kind of cool idea, except it had several problems. Reviewers agreed that in most cases, $20 was too high. Not to mention the screen ratio differences and the lack of multiplayer. This made SMB look kind of strange (though, admittedly, not as bad as the GBC version), and Bomberman not very fun.

@ Koopaul: When comparing the "Wii Era" with the "Dork Age", I do kind of miss the GameCube era. Sure, Nintendo was in third place, but it at least seems like Nintendo was still the Nintendo we knew and loved. Worse, during the Wii Era, NP sold out to Future US, in which the quality dropped significantly. Anyway, I am not saying that the Wii Era is not the best, or that the Dork Age was the worst. The Era of Pokémon was probably one of the worse, because outside of Pokémon and the Zelda Oracle series, there wasn't much. (OK, Majora's Mask did appear during that time).

Still, I do need a better age for the "Dork Age". It wasn't THAT bad on the surface (a lot of great games came out during that time), but certainly not GOOD, even for a Nintendo fan. The 64 Era, on the other hand, was arguably the beginning of the end, and started the spin into the Cube era (that isn't a good name either), but arguably, the beginning of the end, the reason why Nintendo always doesn't try to be like Sony and Microsoft, happened at the beginning of the 1990s, when Sony wrote up that contract, and Nintendo had to cut them off. The 2003-2005 time was a distinct era, and needs a good title, that's for sure.

Perhaps it was the fact that the GameCube didn't have a great "killer app" title to drive it. Super Smash Bros. Melee, Super Mario Sunshine, and The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker were great, but they were not nearly as revolutionary and anticipated as their N64 predecessors, and didn't provide a good enough reason for PS2 and Xbox players to join Nintendo. Resident Evil 4 was a great game, but by January 2005, it was "too little, too late".

[The Qu]

Aug 12, 2010 12:10:04 GMT -5 TV Eye said:

To me, the Gamecube had fantastic games, there just weren't enough to go around. Though, I never owned one, and am only now getting into Gamecube games on account of the Wii's backwards compatibility.

This is the best way to put it. The failure of the Gamecube was not on Nintendo's shoulders, but the third parties for jumping ship. A lot like the Wii, actually.