NintendObs Thinks: Graphics, sadly, do not matter.
Look at the sales, and they'll tell you all you need to know.
I’m a Nintendo gamer, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t like a beautiful game. Animal Crossing New Horizons is beautiful. Luigi’s Mansion 3 is beautiful. Metroid Dread. Without requiring any 4K, ray tracing or whatever, Nintendo does manage to output very good-looking games on a comparatively and purposefully limited platform. That being said, graphics do not matter when it’s all said and done. Like I was discussing last week, I can’t complain enough regarding what this reality allowed the Pokémon franchise to become, but at the same time, the Game Freak situation among other observations makes such a fact about graphics undeniable right now and for the few years incoming.
Graphics intensive titles are simply not the most financially successful, which is even more counterproductive since they’re the most expensive to produce and the most expensive to promote. The only value they have, and probably the core reason for their existence, is the publicity they offer to their developers, publishers, and the platforms where they release. Case in point, Sony and Microsoft can make and commission as many PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X titles with high visuals as they want, it is already guaranteed they will never provide the same degree of revenue as Nintendo’s top 5 titles on Nintendo Switch, even though they require a lot more efforts in terms of means and marketing.
Therefore, it does not matter what gamers claim they want, or more specifically, what they believe they actually want. What matters are the results seen at the ballot box of the videogame box office. The consumers’ decision with their voting cash is unambiguous. As Pokémon Legends Arceus’s success illustrates, they want the franchises they love, with a concept they can celebrate, no matter what they look like. Developers and publishers would have everything to win if only they focused on developing their intellectual properties and continually refreshing these IPs like Nintendo and The Pokémon Company did for the last decades, rather than doing the same thing over and over with more resources to the benefits of a select few entities which may or may not be that interested in the advancement of gameplay in videogames.