Daily Reflection: Nintendo Is Just Too Hard To Keep Up With

The days tick over quickly here at ZI, where there’s so much going on – both within and without of our community. Nintendo just has so much going on to keep us busy. So many games coming up, so much to discuss. When will the titles we’re expecting for the 3DS come? How much will the 3DS end up costing? Luckily there’s several of us keeping ZI updated, because it’s just too much for one person. With that said, here I am tonight filling in for Nate with our end of day reflection. Jump inside for a recap of our posts, the goss around the community, and my thoughts on ‘keeping up’ with Nintendo.

Today’s Posts:

Pachter’s Prediction, Wii Needs Another Price Cut: Due to the increased competition in the market with Playstation Move and X-Box Kinect, is a price cut the only way for the Wii to remain competitive? Alex Plant discusses Michael Pachter’s opinion on the matter.

Is Handheld Gaming About to Explode?: Smartphones, the 3DS, the NGP – it looks like 2011 is shaping up to be a year where portable gaming really takes off and becomes more prominent in society. Alex Plant looks at the possibilities.

NGP (PSP 2) Vs. Nintendo 3DS Round 2: Fight!: With the upcoming release of both the Nintendo 3DS and PSP2 (aka – Next Gen Portable – NGP) is the industry of portable gaming going to really take of? It looks like there is going to be some heated competition. Nate discusses the similarities and differences of the two and looks at how they match up.

Happy First Birthday Metroid Wiki: Zelda Informer’s side project, Metroid Wiki, turned one year old today, which is a fabulous feat. Be sure to get involved in this ever-expanding and growing community.

Around the Community:

Curiosity Shop #045: Zelda Dungeon Mailbag: Axle the Beast delivers Zelda Dungeon’s mail bag, after a two week hiatus. There are nine questions answered such as “There’s always talk of wars in Hyrule but we never see them. How do you feel about a game in the middle of one?” and “What do you think of Zelda games without Princess Zelda in them?”.

Today’s Reflection: Nintendo Is Just Too Hard To Keep Up With

For us Nintendo fans, there just doesn’t seem to be any rest. Often people complain that Nintendo has large gaps where there isn’t any big software releases, and that’s true, but not at the moment. There are so many upcoming games, so many past games, and so many present games for us to experience. There’s such a range. Nintendo has become so large and targets such a wide audience, that I feel like I just can’t keep up, let alone catch up. Both monetarily and time-wise.

Here at ZI we just barely manage to keep up with all of the main Nintendo news – that’s thanks to there being multiple of us. Other people can’t experience games for you though. There are so many great games in Nintendo’s past that I’m still longing to experience – Link’s Awakening, Oracle of Ages and Seasons, Four Swords, Four Swords Adventures, Super Mario Sunshine, Pokemon Battle Revolution, Silent Hill: Shattered Memories. My list goes on. But forget nostalgic games of the past – I’ve still got to catch up from last year alone: There’s Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, Kirby’s Epic Yarn, Donkey Kong Country Returns, Epic Mickey and Metroid:Other M.

And 2011 is hardly here yet. There’s the 3DS to come along with all of its games like Kid Icarus: Uprising, Ocarina of Time, Professor Layton, Mario Kart, Paper Mario and so on. There’s Skyward Sword, Dragon Quest VI, Pokemon Black and White and more and more. Sure there may be occasional gaps in Nintendo’s releases, but there sure is a pretty consistent stream of games. A stream that I doubt we can all keep up with.

There will of course be the issue of money – more relevant to some of us than others. We simply can’t afford hundreds, even thousands of dollars per year on our gaming hobby. Gamers do vary and I don’t like to generalize, but largely we are students and part time workers. Gaming is an expensive hobby. There’s also the issue of time. Even if we can afford them – with work, study, family, friends, relationships and everything else – we can’t fit in the time to experience every game. Unless we can somehow come across endless money and learn to live without sleep we must compromise.

Heading into 2011, what are my plans? Learning to prioritize. There are some gaming experiences that I’m just going to have to pass up. Others like Skyward Sword I know I won’t miss. I’ll end up missing a lot of great games, and probably experiencing some bad ones, but that’s a judgment I have to make. Is that good enough? Perhaps it is reasons like this that there are game rental places, but I’m not gonna go there. What about you? What do you think? Is Nintendo just too hard to keep up with? How do you manage?