Eurogamer's take on the Nintendo conference--http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2012-06-06-e3-reaction-nintendo-blows-its-e3-conference-opportunity
"In the end, the conference that we were told would be about nothing but Wii U games was also a little bit about hardware and a little bit about the 3DS anyway, but the hardest pill for hyped-up Nintendo fans to swallow was that so few of the games were exclusives aimed at them. Just Pikmin 3 and New Super Mario Bros. U, and the reception to the latter suggested that it's already become the second-tier Mario series in most people's minds."
"Nintendo Land, though well-intentioned, fell completely flat - I have never, ever witnessed only a smattering of polite applause at the end of a Nintendo conference. In the atmosphere of snap judgements that pervades E3 platform holder presentations, where everything must be hastily categorised and there is no patience for explanation, Katsuya Eguchi's interesting and reasonable demonstration of the concepts barely penetrated the air in front of his face, so clouded was it by anticipation, and it was simply too easy for those at the Nokia Theatre and viewing at home to label it a mini-games compilation aimed at casual gamers. Repeated allusions to Wii Sports - a mini-game compilation that transcended preconceptions - as a reference point also failed to have the desired effect."
"But of course Nintendo failed to grasp several important things. For one, as Geoff Keighley tried to explain to Reggie Fils-Aime in almost heated exchanges on Spike TV right after the conference, everyone who knew they wanted a Batman game already bought Arkham City last year and they will not be convinced to give WB and Nintendo $60 for another copy no matter how elaborate the embellishments."
"As Oli Welsh said when he actually got to play it, "in many ways Nintendo Land shows the Kyoto developers at their best: realising new gameplay ideas with clarity, perfecting tactile control schemes and designing with clever restraint." When viewed dispassionately, there was lots of evidence of that throughout Nintendo's conference."
"Perhaps the most depressing thing, however, is that I was able to use the phrase "unique capabilities" earlier for probably the first time in the whole of the 2012 Electronic Entertainment Expo, in reference to the Wii U, which is a potentially magical and wondrous piece of technology, but I had to do so in the context of savaging Nintendo's public relations. If nothing else underlines the scale of its conference blunder, then hopefully that does. A wasted opportunity."
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the dreamer of improbable dreams