Nintendo Switch 2 has a secret weapon that Sony has just discovered – Reader’s Feature

A reader is very interested in Sony’s reaction to the success of Astro Bot and thinks it could open up a whole new chapter for PlayStation.

There sure has been a lot of PlayStation news this week, between the mixed reception State of Play and the news that it had an unexpectedly good Christmas, despite having no games. The thing that caught my interest the most though, was that they’re intending to make more family friendly games, in the wake of Astro Bot’s success.

This would seem to me to be a no-brainer and yet it’s not really something they’ve done for two generations now. Why on earth they stopped I do not know but you would’ve thought they might’ve taken some sort of cue from Nintendo that maybe only aiming your games at 20 to 30-something men was a bit restrictive.

Being family friendly seems to be used as an insult by many hardcore gamers but it’s the secret weapon that has kept Nintendo going since forever and allowed them to weather difficult times. If Sony has finally realised this then that could have more impact on gaming than maybe anything else this year, especially if it enable them to battle the Nintendo Switch 2 more effectively.

The thing with the phrase ‘family friendly’ – whether it’s games or movies or whatever – is that it absolutely does not mean it’s made for kids. It means it’s suitable for the whole family. Monopoly is family friendly. Star Wars is family friendly. Just Dance is family friendly. Mario and Zelda are family friendly, and yet Kirby is made for kids.

Being family friendly means that anyone can enjoy it and with the sort of things I’ve just listed you can see that they very clearly do. I always hate having a family friendly award at The Game Awards because it’s just a dumping ground for anything that isn’t an 18-rated game.

It’s really unhealthy to think of violence as the default state for all video games and that anything that doesn’t conform to that is a niche category that’s basically only for children. Nintendo understand that and it seemed to be, in the first two or three generations, that so did Sony until they… forgot?

As has been pointed out, it’s very strange that Microsoft and Sony keep going on about a lack of growth (notice how Nintendo never does) but they’re never specific about who they’re going to target that’s new. That may be simply because they don’t know but surely families should’ve been the first option?

The Wii was all about expanding the market and there was endless stories about pensioners and non-gamers and whoever else playing. Apart from some rubbish, knock-off motion control devices Microsoft and Sony has never tried to do that and have just sort of sat around complaining that, after trying nothing, they’re all out of ideas.

My hope is that Sony is serious about making more games like Astro Bot. They said that they didn’t care that it didn’t sell that much, so that seems a good sign. So now commission a sequel, as I’m sure they’ll do, but start exploring more family friendly games.

That doesn’t mean try to clone Zelda and Mario Kart but instead come up with your own ideas. Look at Nintendo as inspiration, sure, but only in the sense that they try to make their games for as many people as possible without compromising what they are. The Nintendo Switch 2 is going to sell like crazy and it’s in large part because anyone can pick up and enjoy their games, no matter their age.

Mario is for absolutely everyone, Zelda is a little more serious, and Metroid even more so. So there are levels to these things and every kind of game you could imagine can be family friendly, from a real-time strategy (Pikmin) to an online shooter (Splatoon).

Sony and others should’ve figured out Nintendo’s secret a long time ago but if it’s finally dawning on them what they’ve been missing out on all this time then gaming could become a lot more inclusive and imaginative than it has been the last few years.

By reader Combi

The reader’s features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro.

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