For almost two decades now, Nintendo consoles have been mockingly referred to as “Nintendo Players.” The title came about during the Nintendo 64 days and grew into widespread use within the Gamecube’s lifetime due to both consoles’ lack of strong third party support. It didn’t help that Nintendo’s steady flow of big name, first party titles squashed what little third party support did actually exist during those times. Fortunately for Nintendo, things have changed with the Wii.
It now has more third party support than any Nintendo system before it, which has caused the “Nintendo Player” moniker to fade away to an extent. However, Nintendo now has the problem of having a lot of non-Nintendo games that just aren’t any good, but Holiday 2010 looks like it may set a new trend for third party quality.
To alert gamers to this possible new trend, Nintendo sent out a press release on November 1st announcing some of the Wii’s hottest third party holiday titles, and a good majority of the titles listed actually have the hype surrounding them to rival some of Nintendo’s biggest franchises.
Releasing just this past week was Activision’s re-imagining of the N64 classic GoldenEye, GoldenEye: 007, which has already received many favorable reviews from both the public and the media. November 16th will see Sega’s latest attempt to make the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise relevant again with Sonic Colors. Unlike previous Sonic titles, game enthusiasts have kept a keen eye on this title for quite some time. And, rounding out the month of November is perhaps Mario’s only real mascot competition these days, the iconic Mickey Mouse; with Disney Epic Mickey set to hit stores on November 30th.
These three titles, especially Disney Epic Mickey, are key to successful Wii sales this holiday. Granted, they will have Donkey Kong Country Returns to contend with, but the hype surrounding all three of these games should be enough to cause fairly even sales for each game all the way through Christmas. If any of these three games can do nearly was well as Donkey Kong Country Returns is set to do, the title “Nintendo Player” may very well disappear after Holiday 2010.
