Genres that Nintendo Re-Defined

[racketboy]

Ack and I have been working on a Punch Out piece and I was thinking about how Nintendo has been so good at taking pre-existing genres and totally re-working them to make them more accessible/friendly for a wider audience.

Punch Out was totally different than existing boxing games as it had a much different presentation and a puzzle-like approach to gameplay.

Other examples are Pikmin and the Real-Time Strategy genre or Mario Kart and the racing genre.

Which other ones can you think of?

[the King]

Animal Crossing and the real life sim genre?

[Ack]

I would say Smash Bros. redefined what a fighting game could be. It's really made more of a..."party fighter" I suppose, though it hasn't really caught on with other companies since most of their attempts have been pretty shoddy. Onimusha Blade Warriors, anybody?

[Lazer]

Super Mario 64 / Platformers

[HellHammer]

I'd say Mario Party re-defined board game video games, if by nothing other than making them somewhat enjoyable. If you've ever been through a game of Anticipation on the NES, you know what I'm talking about.

And Rhythm Tengoku games re-defined mini games by adding music and timing aspects.

I feel like adding Star Fox, or at least the early ones, but I can't exactly say why...

[Harvey]

I would say Smash Bros. redefined what a fighting game could be. It's really made more of a..."party fighter" I suppose, though it hasn't really caught on with other companies since most of their attempts have been pretty shoddy. Onimusha Blade Warriors, anybody?

Hopefully the TNMT fighter will change the shoddiness factor in the part fighter (I like that term).

I'll second Mario 64. Before I even knew the word "platformer," this game redefined for me what a video game could do.

[Dakinggamer87]

3D platformers: Super Mario 64
Party games: Mario Party series
RTS: Pikmin series

[Snickerd00dle]

Paper Mario and all of the mario rpgs were pretty interesting renditions of rpgs, more interactive battle systems and good stories that had tons of characters

[molotovwars]

Much like Punch-Out, I know a lot of the Mario sports games have been good fun games, bringing sports games to a wider audience. I wouldn't play madden or fifa or anyone of those, but I'd play a mario variant. The only sports game I really got into was Virtua Tennis. I haven't played any of the Mario Tennis games, but considering they are on N64, GBC, Gamecube, and now with Wii controls, I think its been pretty successful.

[newt42]

I'd say that any of the Pokemon games redefined RPG's more than anything else made by Nintendo.

EDIT: I might be wrong, being a person who has not played any of the Paper Mario games...