It is always difficult to create a spin-off or a game derived from a major license without falling into the opportunistic or visibly too commercial title or even into the WTF the most complete. Depending on the licenses, you have to choose the games that use them carefully. So if Mario entitled to Mario Party or some Mario Sports, this is not the case Zelda for example that we find on the other hand in “Warriors” or multiplayer action-adventure titles. Sometimes there are innovations that hit the mark like Pokémon Snapa safari photo Pokémon which fits perfectly into the universe from the Serie. Other times it falls rather flat like with SoulCalibur Legends, Castlevania Judgment or Dragon Quest Swords: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrorsthree spin-offs exclusive to the Wii which, to say the least, disappointed the players at the time (especially since the canonical games were absent from the console then.) At the same time, the border is always very thin between the WTF and the misunderstood genius…
The former president of Nintendo of America, Reggie son-Aimé knows something regarding it. In full promotion of his book, “Disrupting the Game”, le Regginator, never stops telling anecdotes revealing behind the scenes of the releases of certain emblematic titles of his presidency. Thus, we learned that it is thanks to his intuition and his perseverance that Wii Sports was eventually sold as a bundle with the Wii in the West (read here.) But Reggie apparently wasn’t always so inspired. Thus, he reveals in an interview with G4TV, that he hated Donkey Congothe rhythm game of the GameCube sold with “bongos”, allowing you to hit them like small drums. He thought the game”was going to hurt the Donkey Kong license” . He was so convinced of it that he even fought with Nintendo for not releasing the game. Eventually, Nintendo had the final say and Donkey Congo was released worldwide in 2003-2004. By Reggie’s own admission, Donkey Congo sold rather well but it was not “really not a fan”.
Note that subsequently two more Donkey Congo came out (the 3 only in Japan) and the Bongos were used for another game Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong : Jungle Beat released in 2005Always on GameCube. To conclude, we can say that if we obviously have to be careful not to overuse the big successful licenses, what matters above all is the quality of the titles and their respect for the original material.
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