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[Industry] Can there be Mainstream Family Oriented Games?

Jeremy23000Jeremy23000 Indie DeveloperHalifax, Nova Scotia, CanadaRegistered User regular
(Hopefully this is the appropriate section for this, I wasn't certain exactly where to place it)

I've been curious about this for a little while now, but do you guys think the gaming industry could make Family Oriented Games for everyone? Nintendo has always seemed to attempt this, but with the Wii-U not doing so well, would other console developers be willing to take the risk (Fill the gap)?

I've done some minor research through Indie development as well and there doesn't seem to be very much at all in there either. I'm guessing most crowd-sourcing groups don't have those in their radar's either.

I'd rather this not turn into a violence in video games debate - I personally don't think video games have much of an effect on a mentally stable person, but I think ESRB ratings are there for a reason. I also think that if we want kids to be play age appropriate games, we should give them some actual options. I'm just not sure if the Market is willing to try (as it's all about the profits in the end - and remaking what works).

I'm really more concerned with the major consoles (PC, PS3/4, XBOX360/1), handhelds and others (casual gaming devices) have much shorter development times and smaller costs. I'm just curious if you think the gaming industry could develop large games for a younger audience?

Let's use LEGO games as an example for this.

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    AllforceAllforce Registered User regular
    I'm not sure what your looking for here, as huge mainstream games that are family friendly already exist and have for years.


    Skylanders, Lego games, Mario games, Pokemon, Disney games, Just Dance, the list goes on and on.

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    Jeremy23000Jeremy23000 Indie Developer Halifax, Nova Scotia, CanadaRegistered User regular
    Most of those always seemed more Nintendo games to me though.

    I guess I'm more curious about what would happen if Nintendo wasn't an option for developers/parents (completely hypothetical).

    Although Skylanders is something I completely forgot about, I guess I still need to do more research for myself on this.

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    AllforceAllforce Registered User regular
    Lego is WB, Just Dance is Ubisoft and that franchise is one of the top 10 selling each and every year. It makes them billions. They sell the most already on PS3 and 360 since there's almost 170 million of those sold combined.

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    Jeremy23000Jeremy23000 Indie Developer Halifax, Nova Scotia, CanadaRegistered User regular
    That's good to know, thanks a lot for the info.

    I'm looking at a possible job change into children's games (from casual), so I'm a little uncertain about the market there. Fear of the unknown I suppose.

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