Puzzle games are extremely popular and definitely not a niche genre. Tetris is one of the best selling games of all time.
Adventure games have been niche for generations, what Life Is Strange basically constitutes.
Shenmue can market itself as a smaller open-world. More people are hesitant to big, sprawling open worlds with checklists of things to do. Shenmue's bread and butter is a more intimate open-world. You can sell that to people.
And Shenmue is more than about chopping wood. It's a kung fu simulator. There are zero games besides Shenmue that have you feel like you're actually building up to becoming a true kung fu master. Oh, they'll do it in one game. Shenmue? Multiple. Shenmue is an epic. It is about more than chopping wood.
life is strange is literally a game about teenagers getting in shouting matches at each other/authority figures and constant drama.
Yes, a game that goes into the lives of people is usually considered boring. It's not an action-game. It's not a zombie fest. It doesn't use a big license. Your sentence here also betrays yourself. Shenmue is about a boy on a quest for revenge to become a kung fu master to defeat his fathers killer. Which sounds more boring? Teenage shout matches or the epic kung fu story? Did you not just say that story-oriented games sell well now?
Does Shenmue not fall into this category then? Shenmue II has far more action and adventure than Life Is Strange. Have you actually ever played Shenmue II? On the surface, Life is Strange is FAR more boring than Shenmue.
If you haven't noticed, most games are action games. It's why something like Phoenix Wright would be considered a boring game. It's a game that has zero action. It's about clicking on shit and providing evidence and talking to people. It's basically a point and click adventure game tied with a VN. But it did well because it worked to its own strengths. It's definitely not mainstream. But it's not like it's a horrific failure either.
Not a single one of the games you listed is anywhere near as weird and niche as shenmue, theyre all stock standard VNs, RPGs, etc. Commercially successful genres that generally appeal to millions.
A game like V-a11-halla is definitely weird. Stop lying to yourself to take an opportunity to shit on Shenmue and try to understand my point. It's a weird game.
And definitely not stock.
And yet it has carved a niche for itself and is pretty successful.
I wasn't focused on genre until this post. You clearly do not understand the history of the games, franchises, and genres I'm talking about.
You have to really, really try to convince yourself, very hard, or be completely ignorant of the history of jrpgs and adventure games to say that Life Is Strange, Va11halla, Ys, and Valkyria Chrocniles are not niche products. Just like how Fire Emblem is a niche product that somehow found success. So niche it was on its death bed. Like I said: niche games and genres have a lot of options these days, more than ever before. Surely there's room for a kung fu simulator epic.
