bitrot
Petz Petter
Posts: 31
Petz Versions: 5, 4
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Post by bitrot on Jan 19, 2022 16:07:37 GMT -5
okay, so i've got something i wanna talk about regarding, uh... new petz. (RAUCOUS BOOING ERUPTS FROM THE CROWD) okay, okay, i get it! so i think everyone's sort of agreed that ubisoft petz shouldn't be considered the same petz series. for all intents and purposes, they're two distinct franchises that just happen to have the same name. HOWEVER! would you believe me if i said that some of these games -- namely, the catz and dogz games for the gameboy advance (and i believe a couple of the early ds games as well?) LITERALLY weren't originally petz games? neither PF magic OR ubisoft was involved with the development of them! i was hitting "random page" over and over on tcrf.net (i do this regularly) when i came across a familiar page. i actually loved catz and dogz for the gba as a kid, so imagine my surprise when they came up... under completely different names. the nakayoshi pet advance series was a series of games developed and published in japan by MTO. you'll notice that the names "ubisoft" OR "petz" don't show up in that sentence. as far as i can tell, the only involvement that ubisoft / the "petz" branding had with this game at all was post-development, where they (i'm assuming) translated the game and shipped it out to international audiences... with a completely different branding. it's like if nintendo took a japanese-release-only digimon game, helped translated it, and then released it overseas as a pokemon game. they're two COMPLETELY distinct series with their own game mechanics and playstyles??
i know the ubisoft petz games aren't talked a lot about here, and they're different enough that i figured it probably wouldn't be appropriate to post this thread in the petz talk board -- let me know if i've put it in the wrong place, though! i just thought this was interesting :D
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Post by lobb on Jan 19, 2022 19:26:38 GMT -5
I think has been discussed before, a lot of the new games are random pet-themed games that were released as something else entirely in Japan but Ubisoft released them in the West under the "petz" name. I didn't know that about Nakayoshi pet games, though. Are these successful games in Japan?
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bitrot
Petz Petter
Posts: 31
Petz Versions: 5, 4
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Post by bitrot on Jan 19, 2022 19:57:03 GMT -5
i've been doing some internet sleuthing to figure that out, and it seems that MTO has actually released a lot of pet games since (that weren't released outside of japan, from what i can tell?) as recently as 2013! (which... isn't that recent, actually.) i THINK they're part of the same series*, but it's hard to tell because i'm running the webpage through google translate, which probably isn't giving me anything super-accurate. >_> it's the same devs, at least. i'd love to get my hands on a copy of one of these games, though! the 3d models are pretty cute -- they're a lot more cartoonish/stylized than the designs that ubisoft decided on for the "petz" ds games
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Post by Anthracite on Jan 20, 2022 14:56:49 GMT -5
We know, they were just cheap shovelware for easy profit. Sad that a proper game like the original petz won't be considered profitable enough to bother with nowadays when they can just repackage somet already made that's vaguely related.
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Post by Thor on Jan 20, 2022 15:09:35 GMT -5
Sad indeed-- but I do wonder if this sort of thing still flies today? I feel like because the world is more globalized that it would be harder to pass off some random other game from another country under some random IP? Like for example, imagine getting the new Starcraft game and seeing something completely not Starcraft, but like space themed alien invasion game? Like, I wonder if that happens?
Ubisoft probably got away with it back in the early 00s because there wouldn't be anyone to check them on it? I mean so what if a bunch of fans complained/got mad-- still made profits because tons of little kids around the world got the gift of "Petz" from random family members. Especially handheld!! That was the market for kids indeed.
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Post by Anthracite on Jan 20, 2022 15:21:15 GMT -5
Slavic Magic had to fight to get adverts taken down for some Chinese company ripping off Manor Lords, and that's not even finished yet, so yes they still try.
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bitrot
Petz Petter
Posts: 31
Petz Versions: 5, 4
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Post by bitrot on Jan 20, 2022 15:30:22 GMT -5
We know, they were just cheap shovelware for easy profit. Sad that a proper game like the original petz won't be considered profitable enough to bother with nowadays when they can just repackage somet already made that's vaguely related. maybe i'm being nitpicky, but i don't necessarily think that all of mto's "petz" (airquotes) games are inherently shovelware? they're definitely not petz games by any stretch of the imagination, but i think they have their own charm! petz dogz/catz 2 for the ps2 and wii, for instance, are... as far away from petz as you can get (an adventure game?? why was this branded as petz??) but it still holds up as a pretty decent game in my opinion! (take my opinion with a grain of salt, though, because i might have nostalgia goggles on haha)
all of the petz games afterwards, though... 100% shovelware for sure. i mean, petz pony beauty pageant? that's just a bunch of keywords that they thought kids would like! XD
Sad indeed-- but I do wonder if this sort of thing still flies today? I feel like because the world is more globalized that it would be harder to pass off some random other game from another country under some random IP? Like for example, imagine getting the new Starcraft game and seeing something completely not Starcraft, but like space themed alien invasion game? Like, I wonder if that happens? Ubisoft probably got away with it back in the early 00s because there wouldn't be anyone to check them on it? I mean so what if a bunch of fans complained/got mad-- still made profits because tons of little kids around the world got the gift of "Petz" from random family members. Especially handheld!! That was the market for kids indeed. as far as i can tell, ubisoft stopped using nakayoshi pet series games as "petz" games pretty early into the nintendo ds' lifespan! the last mto/ubisoft "collaboration" (ubisoft literally just translated them lol) was before they made the transition to 3d models as opposed to the 2d sprites. maybe they realized they might not be able to get away with it anymore?
(it's also probably why the later games for ds became unapologetic shovelware as opposed to just "meh, cute but it's still not petz". once ubisoft realized they couldn't just piggyback off of already finished games by slapping the "petz" branding on them, they just started throwing their own stuff together as haphazardly as possible)
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Post by lobb on Jan 21, 2022 17:10:39 GMT -5
I'm on the fence about the new petz status as shovelware. I'd define shovelware as kind of generic, crappy games meant mainly to make a quick profit without much regard for quality or interest. A lot of new Petz games certainly come across that way, as mainly existing to get kids to buy games with cute pets that are just not that good. Some of them, though, seem like they were genuine efforts at making games, even if the end results were mixed.
My guess as to why "Petz" isn't used nowadays is that it probably just got a bad reputation as a very, very mixed bag (and more bad than good).
I don't think Ubisoft stopped using petz because of the world being more connected or not getting away with it. They weren't doing anything illegal, they technically owned the Petz brand and my guess is that releasing other games under that title was probably covered by licensing agreements. That also makes some marketing sense, "Petz" had a bit more name recognition than "Random Japanese Pet Game We Just Imported". I'm sure they still made some solid profits out of it.
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bitrot
Petz Petter
Posts: 31
Petz Versions: 5, 4
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Post by bitrot on Jan 21, 2022 21:45:01 GMT -5
that's definitely fair! the definition of shovelware varies depending on who you ask, so it makes sense that different people would have different opinions.
it seems like ubisoft developed petz games in-house for a while after dropping mto (the most recent ubisoft petz game was for the 3ds in late 2014, but the last mto/ubisoft petz game was an adventure game spinoff for consoles in 2007 -- before that, it was 2004). i'm not sure why they stopped partnering with mto, especially considering that mto continued to make pet games up until 2013. however, i'd assume the reason ubisoft stopped making petz games in general was because they weren't turning a profit with them; that's just conjecture on my part, though, i can't seem to find conclusive sales data.
i'm honestly surprised that they didn't try to go back to the series' roots at least once in all that time. i know that handhelds (which is pretty much what ubisoft focused on, petz-wise) had limited processing power back then, but still!
also, i didn't mean to imply that ubisoft was doing anything illegal with the nakayoshi pet games! i'm sure that mto agreed to it, i just wanted to comment on how that sort of thing (unrelated games being added to preexisting franchises while being released overseas, i guess?) doesn't happen as often nowadays.
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Post by lobb on Jan 27, 2022 17:09:42 GMT -5
I suspect you're right about Petz no longer being profitable for Ubisoft. The early 2010s also coincided with smartphones becoming more popular so there was probably more competition in the "mediocre pet games" market, especially considering all the free-to-play ones. I'm not sure they regret what they did with Petz since it still brought them money in the laziest way possible, but they really have nobody but themselves to blame.
You're right about the hardware limits. We KNOW "our" Petz worked ok on more limited hardware because there was a Gameboy Colour version of Catz and Dogz. It seems kind of obscure and I've seen reviews criticising it for being more limited than the PC version, but I really liked it as a kid. With something like the DS or the 3DS, they could make something even closer to our beloved games. My guess is that they a) felt like the cartoon graphics were too outdated and b) didn't want to bother adjusting things like the AI and other features.
It's a real shame, I'd definitely buy a 3DS game that was like PFM Petz.
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bitrot
Petz Petter
Posts: 31
Petz Versions: 5, 4
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Post by bitrot on Jan 27, 2022 19:02:36 GMT -5
yeah, i think that programming the ai might have been the biggest reason that a PFM-esque petz game was never released. i mean, the pet ai in the original games was incredibly complex for the time -- people are still finding stuff out about it today! that sort of thing requires a lot of love and effort, and since petz wasn't ubisoft's top priority, they probably didn't want to bother with something so complex.
i would have loved a 3ds PFM petz game! i actually think that would be a really cute thing to combine with the 3d mechanic (not that i would use it that way lol, my collection of eye problems make 3d effects just Not Work)
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