Dear Nintendo: Please Step Up Your Virtual Console Game

Nintendo make their fair share of questionable decisions; there's no denying that. Moving the latest Legend of Zelda's release date to 2017, completely botching the motion controls for Red Steel, taking Fox McCloud out of his Arwing and giving him a pet dinosaur, and *gulp* the virtual boy are just a few examples of Nintendo dropping the ball. Luckily, it would seem that Nintendo fans are a forgiving bunch, given that we come back time and again to buy variation after variation of the same games we've been playing our whole lives. Don't fix it if it ain't broken. But one cardinal sin from Nintendo goes far past the point of forgiveness.

[Owenza]

Front Mission, with full English translation. I loved this little tactical mech game, but can't read Japanese much at all. Cannon Fodder would transition over very well too, I think, especially with the touch screen.

[rjason12]

Red steel? That's a Ubisoft game. I seriously agree on the virtual console front, they should release 3-4 titles a week

[mrjam0]

Dear Nintendo. Stop charging us repeatedly for games. Thank you.

[Harrylikesgames]

I'd be all over the virtual console scene on my 3ds if the prices weren't so high

[RosweeSon]

Yeah I don't understand why SNES games are £7.19 on 3ds yet get it on Wii U it's £5.49? Con as for this whole buying games again your not forced to repurchase the games again and are they full price no not even close VC games are £4-8 each these games were £40 a pop back in the day the fact I can no play them on the go or have save states or many other improvements I'd happily buy some of these games again not all sure but when they are the timeless classics being released... Sold.

[wonderfulmonkeyman]

Everyone would love them to release 3 or 4 games a week on the VC.
But no one takes the cost that would require, in both man-hours needed to properly set them up and money through deals for older third party games let alone configuring their own, into account.

If Nintendo could find a way to make it happen, though, then I'd love to see Seiken Densetsu 3 get an English translation and put into the Eshop.
That'd be a day 1 purchase for me; the only way to play it in English right now is through a [admittedly VERY extensive and well-done] fan translated ROM, but I'd love to own it in English legitimately and would gladly pay a solid $20 or $30 bucks for it.

[Zeldafan64]

I'd like all the 3ds rpgs on the wii u virtual console.

[Dunban67]

Nintendo seems to have forgotten that it takes money (investment) to make money. They seem to think people should just buy whatever they can cheaply putout 1st in droves then maybe they will throw them a bone- there is a reason why Nintendo has lost serious market share and revenue (in a rising market) every year since 2008/9

[wonderfulmonkeyman]

They're already investing tons of cash in many ventures.
Upcoming theme park plans, merchandising, toys and clothing brands, hell they're even gonna start doing movies on their own soon.
That on top of games means their money is quite spread out; they need to prioritize things into what they feel will be the best investments.
Obviously a VC on a system that too few people are buying, isn't the best investment to make right now.

The NX might be different, but if it isn't, then it's understandable considering all the other things they're paying for in contrast to so many other companies out there.
Gathering the people to find, arrange, and convert all the data that would go into 3 or 4 whole new VC games per week would not be as cheap of a venture as people want to assume; it's not as simple as "snap our fingers and it's done!", especially when taking licensing rights with third parties into account.

Again, I'd love to see myself be proven wrong on this one, but at this point I just don't think it's a plausible investment.
Hell, not even Sony manages that sort of feat as far as I'm aware, and they're the market leader with plenty of PS4 cash to burn. [It's a shame they're losing some of it on that horrible Ghostbusters 2016 film, though.-_-;;]

Oh, and as to market share and revenue; market share I can agree with, on the console side [though I don't agree that VC is the cause.], but Nintendo's not the only one that's made less and less money off of their home consoles since a few gens ago.

[Dunban67]

Wonderfulmonkeyman: Nintendo was PAINFULLY slow getting meaningful VC games on the Wii U from the beginning- THey released a console that by their won admission lacked enough software and they acknowledged they were having a hard time making HD games- that being the situation and the lack of 3rd party games, one would think Nintendo would try to make up for it in other ways like the VC - It is up to Nintendo to make their console appealing to the marketplace-

[wonderfulmonkeyman]

" It is up to Nintendo to make their console appealing to the marketplace"

By that logic, third parties have no chance of carrying the NX.

[Dunban67]

wonderfulmonkeyman It is up to Nintendo to make their console appealing to the marketplace- If that means getting healthy support from 3rd parties then Nintendo needs to make their console appealing to them- that can be done in many different ways - 3rd parties will support a Nintendo console if it makes business sense for them to do so-- It s just simple business. If Nintendo wants or feel like they need more 3rd party support than they had with the Wii U they will have to make it more of a priority-

[Lukejrl]

The emulation scene is exactly why nintendo can't sell the VC. People know there is no excuse for not having more games on there if a guy in his garage can put out an emulator that is pretty accurate and very playable. I get nintendo wants to make money but they are too greedy.

[FLCL4711Fox]

Mario Paint on a handheld? I agree with most of the games but whoever wrote this must have gotten bored and smoked something strong before finishing this list. Mario Paint... My God...

[RosweeSon]

I'd take the fly mini game from it, loved that.

[blawren4]

I wish red steel was a nintendo game. Otherwise we might have red steel 3. 2 was fantastic.

[link2Dpast]

I personally have never used it since I have most of the popular games in physical form but I always hear this from the fans. There sitting on a gold mine and they know it. Is it technological difficult or something that so many GameCube games aren't available when I see on the ps4 u can get PS3 so it is possible but they just won't do it

[smashing4fun]

It's not just a problem with Nintendo. I'm annoyed that the PS4 doesn't have more past games on the PSN. The PS3 has a huge back catalogue of games, some of which I already own. I'd love to play them on my PS4

[Segata]

For their first party VC games wish they would just hire some small studios to do it for them to get them out faster.

[3-4-5]

ahhh another .UK article complaining about Nintendo.

[addman00]

The writer is American. Sorry this doesn't fit into your world view.

[jholden3249]

I don't expect 3-4 games a week. But at least 1-2 good VC games on 3DS and another 1-2 on Wii U each week would be good. I hate how sporadic it is. Just keep a steady flow. And no, Contra 3 doesn't count. That's 3rd party. I'm talking 1-2 1st party VC games.

[JSDude1]

What do you mean? The need more 3rd party games on V.C. There are not enough from the NES era like TMNT, Yo Noid, Maniac Mansion, etc...

[CrimsonWing69]

Man seriously I was just thinking this. Like the Wii was pretty solid on VC front. The Wii U has some really awesome titles like the GBA Fire Emblem's, GBA Castlevania games, Earthbound, Demon's Crest, etc. but there's barely anything getting released on it. Nintendo must not realizing that dropping the ball is a bad thing.

[jonrhoades87]

The PS3 and original Wii are still the kings of legacy platforms, both of which I still use to this day. The old vc obliterates the Wii u one I must say and the PS3 offers a huge catalogue of cheap ps1/ps2 games. Not to mention hd remasters that you can find for super cheap nowadays (each containing two games minimum) and now they re-release pc ports of ps360 games for full price lol.

SNES games on 3ds is dumb, they obviously should have done GBA. Once again there's no crossbuy but that's something that desperately needs remedied with NX with Universal accounts. Rationing the same games out in a spit and sputter doesn't help either, and they need 3rd parties to really make it work since they'll run out of games themselves eventually. I'll stick to what I got for awhile.