/vr/ - Retro Games

>>7675108
Yeah, I was messing around. I agree with everything you said in your previous reply.

This only leaves the question of WHY Nintendo is doing this and if there's any hope they'll change going forward. (I don't think so, if anything it'll get worse)

I think the goofiness you talk of in enemy design in later games, (of which Deadhand is an example of a "proto-goofiness" in N64 days) is a result of Nintendo attempting (and failing) to strike a balance between something threatening/scary and something appealing/likable/not TOO threatening that's also consistent with the rest of the game's cartoony art-style.

Reason this worked better in OOT & MM is that the company wasn't as constrained as being marketable or appealing back then, or at least not in the same way. There wasn't this pressure of being mainstream in the same way. In fact, it was a video game, for God's sake. The characters SHOULD look off-beat and quirky. And certainly the hardware being different is a factor as well, as you point out, I would just argue it's a subordinate one. Yes the N64's primitiveness guarantees everything looks uncanny and goofy anyway, so they embraced it. But if anything as hardware improved they should've flexed their creative muscles MORE, not conservatized. (which is what they did)

That brings me to the biggest determining factor by far: the desire to appeal to as mainstream an audience as possible. There is a fear to the point of irrationality that a normie, a child, a parent would be turned off. Actually, spreading yourself thin is a good way to turn EVERYONE off, since any great creative work is bound to alienate some, and trying to avoid this is bound to wind up in mediocrity.

Of course their primary concern is not making great creative works. It's debatable if it even was back in N64 era, but the pressure was not nearly as extreme, that's the difference.

Pokemon is an extreme example of the art style becoming "one size fits all" and "don't turn off the kiddies."