Warlock
08-31-2002, 04:06 PM
Warning in advance, this will prob. take multiple posts (damn character limit).. here's the link for Insiders, otherwise the thing is below:
http://cube.ign.com/articles/369/369681p1.html
----------------------------------------------------
This week's topic: How should Nintendo market Metroid Prime?
Peer responds: I think this goes back to what we talked about last time. Nintendo was off to a good start with the GameCube commercials last year, but you can't change the consumer's image of the company with one set of commercials. "Playing Nintendo" once meant playing videogames. Now it basically means, "what my kids are playing." Nintendo, not just Metroid, has to be seen as cool.
My suggestion is to go with a campaign that introduces a slogan like: "This is Nintendo?" Start the commercial off with footage of the original Metroid -- cue the latest version of the Metroid intro music. Have a movie-style narrator say: "In 1986, one woman redefined videogame shooters." Cut to Super Metroid. "In 1994, she returned in what many call the best game of all time." Then cut to the space station from the Metroid Prime intro -- without sound. Camera slowly zooms in on Samus. Narrator: "It's been eight years. She has changed. You have changed. WE have changed." Camera quickly goes into her helmet to switch to the first-person perspective. BOOOOM! Unleash 10 seconds of quick, cut-together scenes from the game that show off some of the coolest monsters and weapons, the visor effects, the morph ball -- loud stuff, a la the Alien trailer. "Metroid Prime" -- then flash some stats at the side that show "Dolby Surround," "HDTV-compatible," "Real-time lighting," "Bump mapping," and "Only on Nintendo GameCube."
The idea is to capture the attention of geeks with the old footage, but also show mainstream gamers that this is not your little brother's Nintendo anymore. Nintendo has been way too conservative in touting what the system can do. Throw around the big words that older gamers like, even if many don't understand what they mean. Let them know that GameCube is cutting edge. Show them that Metroid is cutting edge.
Matt responds: I like the idea of the commercial. I would have suggested something entirely similar had you not beaten me to it. You bastard.
But I don't think that one more cool commercial is enough to change Nintendo's image, either. It needs to really build up to something big with Metroid Prime; really stress that the game is hip, cutting-edge, and designed for adult audiences. Perhaps a viral campaign -- something similar to the DataDyne-related Perfect Dark marketing -- could be effective. That, though, is only a starting point.
The simple truth is that it needs to spend some money. It can't whip up a half-assed attempt to sell the game and then rely on brand recognition to do the rest. As much as Nintendo might want it to be, the Metroid franchise is not Mario or Pokemon -- it's a relative unknown to the mainstream audience.
Microsoft faced a similar hurdle when it brought out Halo and it succeeded far better than anybody could have dreamed. Why? It laid out the cash. It had a great product and it promoted the hell out of it. It turned the game into its flagship title and people bought it.
Nintendo has the momentum. Metroid Prime at least comes from a partially recognized brand. To the hardcore audience, the franchise is one of the best. It also has massive hype. The game exceeded expectations at E3 2002 and has continually been named as one of the products to get later this year. So Nintendo needs to capitalize on that.
Run the commercials. Hell, blitz the nation. Spend money. Spend money. Spend money. Nintendo can afford it. Game over gimmicks: show gameplay footage, not Samus running around in a stuffed suit. The footage, with the right presentation, is all anybody needs.
Peer was definitely onto something when he noted that Nintendo should stress the technology too. That's absolutely right. Prove that GameCube can compete. The biggest misconception in the industry is that GCN is less powerful than PS2. People are hesitant to buy into what they perceive to be the crappiest console. That's a lie Nintendo itself nurtured as it refused to ever say otherwise, to always stay conservative. So squash it. Show the footage and say that it runs at 60 frames, that it runs in progressive scan, that it supports Dolby Pro Logic II.
Make Metroid Prime the flagship game. It's clear that the gaming audience is older so why not appeal to them? Mario will still sell. Pokemon will still sell. Metroid Prime, however, will sell systems. Offer it in the bundle. Make available a limited edition Samus colored gold GameCube and ship it with the game for a reasonable price. And again, spend some damn money to promote it.
Craig responds: Back when Star Fox was coming out for the Super NES, Nintendo did a series of teaser ads a month before the game was set for release. They were 15-second shots -- quick blips of gameplay footage (and other stuff, since the graphics were kind of ass in these brief, split-second clips) combined with the release date fading in dramatically.
Now, I don't know if it was because I was eagerly awaiting the game's release, but those ads really got the adrenaline going. Nintendo can definitely do the same thing here with Metroid Prime and perhaps even trigger the Nintendo nostalgia with quick (and I mean, really quick) shots of Samus in her yesteryears -- blown-up pixels and all. Show how much she's evolved with gratuitous, external fly-by shots of her standing and posed via GameCube in-game footage, of course.
And, hey, the tagline: "The Bitch is Back."
Mmm, nah. Too far, methinks. But then again...
Fran responds: Craig, if you ever bad-mouth Samus again, that will be the last of you! Even if just for a joke, I'll have none of it.
Moving on, I think you all have some very good ideas. Like Link and Mario, Samus definitely has nostalgic appeal. Certainly not nearly as much, but the old-school gamers remember her fondly. So, Nintendo should definitely do some kind of 15-second TV spot to appeal to that audience. I was thinking something along the lines of what Peer had in mind. Cue up the music that played in the intro to Super Metroid. From the inside of a Samus's high-tech visor, we see her scanning her past. Clips of Metroid on the NES, Metroid II on the Game Boy, and Super Metroid on the SNES play in high-contrast to the background that lies beyond the visor. I think something like this would be a great approach, because it focuses on the new first-person view behind the visor as well as highlighting her past.
There's obviously a lot of room to stick text onto the visor as well, which has a lot of flexibility. Anyhow, at the end of the shot the camera can dramatically -- in a David Fincher directed sort of way -- pull out of the visor to reveal the ultimate sci-fi hero, the "here to kick a$% and chew bubble gum" bounty hunter, that Samus has become. I'm sure Nintendo could find an in-game scene to suit this need. The taglines at the end could read:
Making History
Metroid Prime
November 18, 2002
This should only be the start, though. Like Matt said, Metroid Prime is a title that will sell systems. Maybe Nintendo doesn't realize it, but if Microsoft can successfully catapult itself into the market place with the image of "Combat Evolved," basically the U.S.-Army in the year 3000, then Metroid Prime should be extremely potent. This isn't a franchise that is distinctly Mario or Zelda. In contrast to that, Metroid Prime has the added advantage of being ultra-cool sci-fi. If Nintendo wants to change its image or prove that it caters to both ends of the demographic spectrum, this is the game to do it. It is not comical. It is not light-hearted.
It's slick. It's cool. It's sexy. The first person at Starcom or Leo Burnett -- Nintendo's advertising think tanks -- that thinks differently should be removed from the account.
I totally agree with Matt. Make a budget for Metroid Prime -- and then double it. Sony and Microsoft may not have as big franchises this year, but they do already hold a ton of consumer interest. The longer Nintendo takes to get aggressive, truly aggressive, the bigger the gamble, and there's no turning back. Now is the time to strike, and Metroid is the right the property to do it.
There's more I want to say, but I'll take a breather before I continue.
Matt responds: I had a buddy over to the office the other day who used to play videogames, then joined the Air Force, and as a result hasn't really followed the scene for several years. After showing him Super Mario Sunshine and Star Fox Adventures, both of which he thought were "nice," he asked me what game I thought was going to be Nintendo's must-have offering this year. I told him Metroid Prime, and then showed him the E3 2002 footage.
His eyes lit up. He kept asking, "This is the Metroid from the old systems?" He was pretty well blown away. Then, the most revealing comment to me, he said: "I can't believe Nintendo is making this."
I think that's the perception that a lot of gamers and non-gamers have -- that Nintendo makes Mario and Pokemon; that "adult" games are on the other systems. So Nintendo would be really smart to play off that and to show its potential buyers that GameCube has all kinds of titles, including dark, sci-fi themed ones with unbelievably cool main characters.
The buyers interested in Mario and Pokemon alone already own a GameCube. Metroid Prime will sell the system to the other guys.
http://cube.ign.com/articles/369/369681p1.html
----------------------------------------------------
This week's topic: How should Nintendo market Metroid Prime?
Peer responds: I think this goes back to what we talked about last time. Nintendo was off to a good start with the GameCube commercials last year, but you can't change the consumer's image of the company with one set of commercials. "Playing Nintendo" once meant playing videogames. Now it basically means, "what my kids are playing." Nintendo, not just Metroid, has to be seen as cool.
My suggestion is to go with a campaign that introduces a slogan like: "This is Nintendo?" Start the commercial off with footage of the original Metroid -- cue the latest version of the Metroid intro music. Have a movie-style narrator say: "In 1986, one woman redefined videogame shooters." Cut to Super Metroid. "In 1994, she returned in what many call the best game of all time." Then cut to the space station from the Metroid Prime intro -- without sound. Camera slowly zooms in on Samus. Narrator: "It's been eight years. She has changed. You have changed. WE have changed." Camera quickly goes into her helmet to switch to the first-person perspective. BOOOOM! Unleash 10 seconds of quick, cut-together scenes from the game that show off some of the coolest monsters and weapons, the visor effects, the morph ball -- loud stuff, a la the Alien trailer. "Metroid Prime" -- then flash some stats at the side that show "Dolby Surround," "HDTV-compatible," "Real-time lighting," "Bump mapping," and "Only on Nintendo GameCube."
The idea is to capture the attention of geeks with the old footage, but also show mainstream gamers that this is not your little brother's Nintendo anymore. Nintendo has been way too conservative in touting what the system can do. Throw around the big words that older gamers like, even if many don't understand what they mean. Let them know that GameCube is cutting edge. Show them that Metroid is cutting edge.
Matt responds: I like the idea of the commercial. I would have suggested something entirely similar had you not beaten me to it. You bastard.
But I don't think that one more cool commercial is enough to change Nintendo's image, either. It needs to really build up to something big with Metroid Prime; really stress that the game is hip, cutting-edge, and designed for adult audiences. Perhaps a viral campaign -- something similar to the DataDyne-related Perfect Dark marketing -- could be effective. That, though, is only a starting point.
The simple truth is that it needs to spend some money. It can't whip up a half-assed attempt to sell the game and then rely on brand recognition to do the rest. As much as Nintendo might want it to be, the Metroid franchise is not Mario or Pokemon -- it's a relative unknown to the mainstream audience.
Microsoft faced a similar hurdle when it brought out Halo and it succeeded far better than anybody could have dreamed. Why? It laid out the cash. It had a great product and it promoted the hell out of it. It turned the game into its flagship title and people bought it.
Nintendo has the momentum. Metroid Prime at least comes from a partially recognized brand. To the hardcore audience, the franchise is one of the best. It also has massive hype. The game exceeded expectations at E3 2002 and has continually been named as one of the products to get later this year. So Nintendo needs to capitalize on that.
Run the commercials. Hell, blitz the nation. Spend money. Spend money. Spend money. Nintendo can afford it. Game over gimmicks: show gameplay footage, not Samus running around in a stuffed suit. The footage, with the right presentation, is all anybody needs.
Peer was definitely onto something when he noted that Nintendo should stress the technology too. That's absolutely right. Prove that GameCube can compete. The biggest misconception in the industry is that GCN is less powerful than PS2. People are hesitant to buy into what they perceive to be the crappiest console. That's a lie Nintendo itself nurtured as it refused to ever say otherwise, to always stay conservative. So squash it. Show the footage and say that it runs at 60 frames, that it runs in progressive scan, that it supports Dolby Pro Logic II.
Make Metroid Prime the flagship game. It's clear that the gaming audience is older so why not appeal to them? Mario will still sell. Pokemon will still sell. Metroid Prime, however, will sell systems. Offer it in the bundle. Make available a limited edition Samus colored gold GameCube and ship it with the game for a reasonable price. And again, spend some damn money to promote it.
Craig responds: Back when Star Fox was coming out for the Super NES, Nintendo did a series of teaser ads a month before the game was set for release. They were 15-second shots -- quick blips of gameplay footage (and other stuff, since the graphics were kind of ass in these brief, split-second clips) combined with the release date fading in dramatically.
Now, I don't know if it was because I was eagerly awaiting the game's release, but those ads really got the adrenaline going. Nintendo can definitely do the same thing here with Metroid Prime and perhaps even trigger the Nintendo nostalgia with quick (and I mean, really quick) shots of Samus in her yesteryears -- blown-up pixels and all. Show how much she's evolved with gratuitous, external fly-by shots of her standing and posed via GameCube in-game footage, of course.
And, hey, the tagline: "The Bitch is Back."
Mmm, nah. Too far, methinks. But then again...
Fran responds: Craig, if you ever bad-mouth Samus again, that will be the last of you! Even if just for a joke, I'll have none of it.
Moving on, I think you all have some very good ideas. Like Link and Mario, Samus definitely has nostalgic appeal. Certainly not nearly as much, but the old-school gamers remember her fondly. So, Nintendo should definitely do some kind of 15-second TV spot to appeal to that audience. I was thinking something along the lines of what Peer had in mind. Cue up the music that played in the intro to Super Metroid. From the inside of a Samus's high-tech visor, we see her scanning her past. Clips of Metroid on the NES, Metroid II on the Game Boy, and Super Metroid on the SNES play in high-contrast to the background that lies beyond the visor. I think something like this would be a great approach, because it focuses on the new first-person view behind the visor as well as highlighting her past.
There's obviously a lot of room to stick text onto the visor as well, which has a lot of flexibility. Anyhow, at the end of the shot the camera can dramatically -- in a David Fincher directed sort of way -- pull out of the visor to reveal the ultimate sci-fi hero, the "here to kick a$% and chew bubble gum" bounty hunter, that Samus has become. I'm sure Nintendo could find an in-game scene to suit this need. The taglines at the end could read:
Making History
Metroid Prime
November 18, 2002
This should only be the start, though. Like Matt said, Metroid Prime is a title that will sell systems. Maybe Nintendo doesn't realize it, but if Microsoft can successfully catapult itself into the market place with the image of "Combat Evolved," basically the U.S.-Army in the year 3000, then Metroid Prime should be extremely potent. This isn't a franchise that is distinctly Mario or Zelda. In contrast to that, Metroid Prime has the added advantage of being ultra-cool sci-fi. If Nintendo wants to change its image or prove that it caters to both ends of the demographic spectrum, this is the game to do it. It is not comical. It is not light-hearted.
It's slick. It's cool. It's sexy. The first person at Starcom or Leo Burnett -- Nintendo's advertising think tanks -- that thinks differently should be removed from the account.
I totally agree with Matt. Make a budget for Metroid Prime -- and then double it. Sony and Microsoft may not have as big franchises this year, but they do already hold a ton of consumer interest. The longer Nintendo takes to get aggressive, truly aggressive, the bigger the gamble, and there's no turning back. Now is the time to strike, and Metroid is the right the property to do it.
There's more I want to say, but I'll take a breather before I continue.
Matt responds: I had a buddy over to the office the other day who used to play videogames, then joined the Air Force, and as a result hasn't really followed the scene for several years. After showing him Super Mario Sunshine and Star Fox Adventures, both of which he thought were "nice," he asked me what game I thought was going to be Nintendo's must-have offering this year. I told him Metroid Prime, and then showed him the E3 2002 footage.
His eyes lit up. He kept asking, "This is the Metroid from the old systems?" He was pretty well blown away. Then, the most revealing comment to me, he said: "I can't believe Nintendo is making this."
I think that's the perception that a lot of gamers and non-gamers have -- that Nintendo makes Mario and Pokemon; that "adult" games are on the other systems. So Nintendo would be really smart to play off that and to show its potential buyers that GameCube has all kinds of titles, including dark, sci-fi themed ones with unbelievably cool main characters.
The buyers interested in Mario and Pokemon alone already own a GameCube. Metroid Prime will sell the system to the other guys.