Nintendo Okie

Capcom recently announced that Monster Hunter 3G will not include online play. The only multi-player that will be featured is local wireless play, meaning you’ll have to gather three friends together to play. There have been a number of games on the 3DS that have forgone online play in favor of local fun, like Star Fox 64 3D, or no multi-player altogether. The reasons are varied, but they’re out there. Having said that, “Why do you think developers are so hesitant to include online play with Nintendo’s handhelds, and do you think Nintendo owners would rather have online, rather than local multi-player for their systems?”

Scott Says: In Japan, I can see local multi-player being really popular and Monster Hunter 3GS will do well there…but in the States, I don’t know why Capcom wouldn’t include online play, other than because the online features(or lack thereof) on the 3DS aren’t up and running yet.

I think chatting would be extremely useful in the game, and that’s something Nintendo hasn’t addressed with the 3DS yet; though a headset is now being released for the system. So, as for Nintendo 3DS owners wanting local or online multi-player, I would say they would probably want both if possible, and in the United States I would guess online multi-player would be the easy choice for most.

Shelby Says: There are two reasons Nintendo’s handhelds don’t get a lot of Wi-Fi enabled games; such modes in handheld games are rarely played and Nintendo has next to zero infrastructure to support online play. Typically when you are in a “mobile” situation, you don’t have access to a wireless internet connection and if you do it’s probably not stable enough to support a good ping. Nobody wants to play Call Of Duty with airport internet. Consider the settings in which you have access to suitable Wi-Fi and want to play a game. Nine times out of ten you are at home and could just as easily play something on a console. Which leads me to my second point; compare Xbox Live to the Nintendo Wi-Fi. Or rather, maybe you should compare a jet airplane to a banana. Sure bananas are good but they do nothing to get you from across the country in a few hours. My point is Microsoft has set the gold standard (get it?) for online functionality with Sony in second and Nintendo in a distant third. Why is Xbox Live so successful? Because Microsoft has built a lot of the tools developers need to make an online game; online in a box if you will (in an Xbox?). Nintendo doesn’t have that and they don’t seem to understand it’s a problem. Given the choice, developers would rather not build an online mode from scratch when they know most people will never touch it. It’s a waste of resources. The PSP is a similar story. There are only 100 or so games of the PSP’s 700 game library that support Wi-Fi and the PSN is far more established than anything Nintendo has made.

I think anyone that owns a system wants as many options to play their games as possible. The problem is, the more options we get the more expensive the game is to develop. I think the term “Nintendo owner” is very broad and not only covers many people in the US but all over the world, especially Japan. But if I had to pick one (and it’s part of the question so I have to) I think the majority of “Nintendo owners” would rather have local multiplayer. My decision is driven by the high percentage of handheld owners that use public transportation in Japan. Keep in mind that of the four PSP Monster Hunter games, only one has Wi-Fi support.

Alex Says: I have to say, this is a crying shame on Nintendo as well as the developers of Monster Hunter. I can not in good faith believe they think multiplayer would not be popular on this game especially. Let’s face it, yes Nintendo is hesitant on online play, but come on! This is Monster Hunter! The one reason to even attempt this online functionality is for sole reason that Monster Hunter has always had the ability to hunt with friends! Now you want me to (forgive the pun), hunt down three friends just to play it together? What if I am some anti-social kid who loves this game but has no friends? Oh, that’s right, my 3DS is pretty much useless now for trying to connect to people.

Tony Says: At this point in time I’m not really sure why developers are hesistant to include online play in more games for Nintendo systems. One of the biggest complaints you hear time and time again are that games on Nintendo platforms don’t have any form of online play. For example, this years edition of NBA 2K forgoes any online support, which seems weird. NBA 2K11 had online play and by all accounts it worked really well so it seems odd not to include it in this years game. I mean, it’s not like it was going to take a whole lot more work to add in a feature that they’ve already developed in the past.

The fact that developers seem to think that the Wii and DS are second tier systems and don’t warrant feature completion with the Xbox and the PS3 has always been troubling to me. Nintendo fans want to be treated with some sense of respect. They’ve chosen to buy a system that they think caters more to their needs, yet they get treated like the red-headed stepchild when it comes to getting games. Too many games for the Wii have been designed as something completely different when there was no reason that the “core” version of the game couldn’t come to the system. Developers don’t give their best effort to Nintendo’s systems and they continue to wonder why people don’t buy games on those systems.

As far as whether I think Nintendo owners want local or online play I really think that’s a regional and cultural thing. Over in Japan where the infrastructure is solid, public transportation is the main form of commuting and people are closer together local play is a great set up. You can meet people on the bus or the subway, hop into a game and play on the commute. Local multi-player seems to thrive over there. Here in America where things are much more spread out it’s more important to have online play. Friends are dozens, sometimes hundreds or thousands of miles apart and it’s just not possible to get together on a regular basis. So here local multi-player, while it was always a strenght of Nintendo, just isn’t as prominent.

Now that you’ve heard what we think why don’t you sound off. Let us know what you think about this question. We’d love to hear from you.