Saving the Princess, or Why Things Never Change

Special Friday update! Today, I'm going to discuss innovation in the 1980s and how the lessons learned then can be applied now.

Er...actually, I'm just looking for an excuse to discuss The Legend of Zelda.

Rewind to the late 1980s. The NES was the coolest thing ever, with its awesome 8-bit graphics and rockin' sound effects. Nintendo developers were working simultaneously on two game titles: one featuring an Italian plumber saving a princess who was always in another castle, and one featuring a pointy-eared kid saving a princess who was being held hostage inside a mountain. Anyway, both games (Mario and Zelda, respectively, in case you hadn't guessed) went on to become huge successes.

Zelda had simple and intuitive gameplay. You control Link, the protagonist, and use a sword to do away with monsters. It used an overhead view, enabling you to maneuver around creatures you'd rather not fight. There was little strategizing required, just basic hand-eye coordination.

Mario, on the other hand, used a side-scrolling format. Again, relatively simple gameplay, but less ability to avoid "the bad guys".

Nintendo, hoping to maximize the fanbase for Zelda, decided to combine the gameplay methods that had made Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda popular in the latter's sequel, Zelda II: The Adventure of Link (AoL).

(Oop, my ADD just kicked in. Must correct poorly-worded sentence on Wikipedia. Click section edit link...make change...write edit summary that's longer than my edit...click show preview...looks good...click save...done. Phew. And all done without having to create an account.)

Back to what I was saying. AoL included the best elements of Nintendo's most successful franchises, so it must have been twice as pleasing for fans, right?

Not.

AoL was poorly received, to say the least. Nintendo was derided for abandoning the core format that had made Zelda so popular. They reverted to the old format and have not attempted anything like AoL again.

Let's see...a company has an established product and radically changes it to provide its audience with what it thinks they want. Where have I heard this recently? Microsoft, with Windows Vista. It altered the core functionalities its users were used to, and everyone complained. It thought that these changes would please both new and returning users, but like Zelda, the reaction was "don't fix what ain't broke."

People are creatures of habit. As a developer, if you have a product that is widely accepted, making sweeping changes carries a high risk. You have to decide if the change is beneficial enough to overcome the inertia that exists.

Quote of the Week (Friday Edition):
"After all, a fake is a fake...and no matter how much you dress it up, the real thing always wins!" --Midna, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess