Live Arcade Criticizes Nintendo

Speaking with Next-Gen.biz, Xbox Live Arcade group manager Greg Canessa sounds off on Nintendo’s anticipated virtual console service for Revolution. The service will allow gamers to download classic NES, SNES and N64 games to Revolution, letting them play their favorite retro games on Revolution.

Canessa told Next-Gen, “I think it was interesting to see Nintendo’s announcement for the Revolution downloadable games service which, of course, came over a year after we launched our initiative internally and around nine months after we already launched the first generation of Arcade for Xbox. I think it was a responsive move. Their service is interesting in sort of a ‘retro’ way, but I view Arcade as being so much more than what they’re planning on doing. Their service is kind of a subset of what we’re doing…”

“When I look at Nintendo Revolution’s retro story, with all due respect to Nintendo, I think it’s a small subset of the opportunity here. To be honest with you, a lot of those games are fun in your head when you think, ‘Oh, yeah when I was 12, this was really fun,’ and you have these great nostalgic reasons to play them. Then you do play them, and they’re just not very fun anymore. But, there are some games like Joust or Gauntlet or Pac-Man that are as fun today as they were back then. A lot of those Nintendo games, you know, aren’t gonna hold up.”

Xbox Live Arcade works similarly to Nintendo’s virtual console system, for those unaware, and also lets players download a number of retro games, such as Gauntlet or Joust, for different prices. The service also serves as a gateway for developers to release original software on Arcade, letting Live subscribers download and play totally brand new titles. For example, with the launch of Xbox 360, Project Gotham Racing 3 developer Bizarre, released Geometry Wars Evolved, which quickly became the most popular and successful Xbox Live Arcade title to date.

Stay tuned to AMN for more on Nintendo’s virtual console service as details become available.