No, Nintendo Doesn’t ‘Need’ Third Parties

The need for Nintendo to attract third parties has been severely overstated, given what niche the Switch is trying to fill in the console marketplace.

[Neonridr]

I mean sure, it won't be as bad as the Wii U since most of the 3DS devs will be jumping on board. But I still think this thing needs as many high profile 3rd party games as it can get. Just because you can view it as a complimentary system doesn't meant that you shouldn't try to have the popular multiplat titles on your system as well.

[Featuring_Dante]

how do you know 'most' of the 3ds devs are jumping ship?
unless you mean atlus... in that case, atlus isn't 'most'

[mzupeman]

He didn't say they were jumping ship. He was saying there's great potential for the third parties already working with the 3DS to now produce for the Switch.

"...will be jumping on board."

[TFJWM]

3DS devs wont be jumping on board right away...Look at the install base of the 3DS, maybe they will port some of the games over but I don't see that many of them looking beyond the 3DS anytime soon

[Neonridr]

don't get me wrong, they aren't going to forget about the 3DS. But we have to look at the Switch as the eventual successor to the 3DS since it's a much more powerful handheld (minus the dual screen feature). I am sure many devs would love to see their handheld games have access to the power that the Switch unit undocked can provide.

[skydragoonityx]

With all due respect, the author has no idea what he's talking about #BlindFanboy

[gangsta_red]

Actually the author makes some very good points. Nintendo has regulated themselves to the side chick for many gamers and especially for major developers.

They have always made systems (since the N64) that catered to their needs and games without thinking about many important 3rd party developers.

I guess it's not really an issue for them since they continue to do this. I personally think they are actually trying to catch that millennial crowd that their commercials push all the time.

[Featuring_Dante]

what do you think of the wiiu?

[_-EDMIX-_]

.....Wii U

[gangsta_red]

The wiiU still followed my opinion on nintendo doing there own thing.

It was definitely a better attempt but it still didn't have the necessary needs for most 3rd parties.

[Nu]

3rd parties would help Nintendo with the games development burden.

[badz149]

@gangsta_red

sure...Nintendo doesn't need 3rd parties

...to help them become irrelevant!

the Switch need to show strong 3rd party supports from the get go and fans will need to help buy those games. if not, in 3 years, it will all be forgotten and a mere blip in the market just like the Wii U

[chrisx]

yea keep telling urself that

[freshslicepizza]

tell that to wii u owners who had many long waits in between big games being released. nintendo is not a development factory, which is why its a shame they are not combining efforts for handheld and console gaming into one. they would rather milk the 3ds market first and then slowly move over to switch.

[Kurisu]

They do. Third party releases ensure a steady flow of games coming to the platform in between exclusives.

[d3nworth1]

Exactly and being able to play the same games you get on ps4 and xbone on the go is a great selling point.

[PhoenixUp]

Yeah it does otherwise the console will only cater to mostly Nintendo fans

"Nintendo isn't targeting first console purchasers anymore. Instead, they are marketing the Switch as a complementary console for PS4 and Xbox One owners who wish to play Nintendo exclusives."

The article agrees with me

[UCForce]

With all due respect, Nintendo do need third party to survive. Otherwise, it won't convince consumers and Nintendo will fall without it.

[zivtheawesome]

third party releases is a must for drawing the casual crowd which is the biggest crowd in the industry. first party are the draw afterwards. if you have no third party then you are only left with the hardcore crowd, which probably isn't more than 10 mil at best for nintendo.

[Spike20XX]

It does when they dont release their biggest IP's on its console.

[Stormswrath4]

They do if they ever want me to buy one of their consoles.

[VersusDMC]

The wiiU didn't have third parties. That worked out...

[Featuring_Dante]

i'm sure that what the world needs is another wiiu lol

[DVAcme]

Not only do they need third party support to fill in the droghts between Nintendo's big releases, Nintendo should also get more developers to work on franchises they're neglecting. How about giving Sega the F-Zero franchise again? Have Retro Studios do Metroid Prime 4. Have someone like Platinum do Kid Icarus. Ninte do's so insular that they're both wearing themselves thin and falling into the Microsoft trap of depending too much on specific IPs. We can only take so many Mario and Zelda games before we're disgusted with the lack of variety.

[TXIDarkAvenger]

"The Wii U failed, not primarily because of a lack of third party support, but because it sold poorly". Yeah no correlation between those two things.

[_-EDMIX-_]

😂😂😂 I love how the author is just oblivious of this

[ziggurcat]

... and yet its low sales was precisely because of its lack of 3rd party support...

[ILostMyMind]

Good luck!

[iwin86]

To say "a plattform doesn't need third parties" is like saying "it's fine to have fewer games and variety on a plattform".

[RSKnight]

The author has absolutely no idea what he is talking about. He has swallowed so much of Nintendo's own bullshit that he can no longer think properly.

Nintendo NEEDS third party games becasue selling a console is their business, and the purpose of a console is to be a platform for other parties to create software for it. That's were most of the money is made, not just in selling hardware. That's why most of the time the hardware is sold at a lost, becasue it is actually an investment. The console manufacturer is investing on a platform that will sell games. And yes, they can also make their own games and sell them on their own console, but that is not the reason they create a console in the first place. If Nintendo ONLY cares about selling their own games then they can do that on whatever console they want. There is no need to create their own console just for that. In fact, making games for their own console only limits their sales potential for those games. All consoles, all of them including Nintendo's consoles, are created to sell third party games first, and first party games second. Third parties business is to make games, and sell them on whatever platform / console possible. If Nintendo's focus is only on selling their own games, then they should forget about making consoles and become a software only company, like any other third party.

But the author just doesn't get it because he is a fanboy, and fanboys don't undertand how a business works.

I'm getting really tired of all these stupid articles talking about how Nintendo is OK without third parties. This only shows that the gaming community doesn't understand the gaming industry at best, or that they are just a bunch of stupid fanboys at worst.

[superchiller]

Why do you think he writes for a website called "goombastomp.com", lol. Obviously a blind fanboy.

[Seraphim]

It needs 3rd parties because Nintendo alone won't bring enough. But in 3rd party I don't mean multi console titles. I mean exclusive 3rd party games. Nintendo is somewhat of a 2nd console to a majority. When it comes to 3rd party most gamers will buy CoD, Madden, whatever, on PS4 or XB1. But to say Nintendo doesn't need 3rd party is a huge mistake. Nintendo studios will not pump out enough games of interest for the vast majority of gamers. Zelda, Mario Kart, Mario later this year, Dragon Quest X and XI who knows when, next Fire Emblem who knows when, etc. I have a pre-order for the Switch and I've been thinking why? Zelda, as if I don't have enough games to play now and soon. After Zelda there is a drastic hole already with far too many questions and Nintendo can not handle it alone. They NEED 3rd party games, more precisely 3rd party exclusives, to fill in the holes and sell the Switch as a secondary console.

[jholden3249]

The more the merrier. Absolutely.

But 3DS is proof a gaming system can offer a completely unique library. And personally, I don't care what kind of games come to the system as long as they're good. Just the Nintendo games alone make the Switch worth owning (even more so with dual functionality). But I'm guessing this thing is going to get more third-party games than even the 3DS did. Only a handful of them will be big AAA titles but... games are games.

Even if it just gets Skyrim, Dark Souls Trilogy and new console quality Monster Hunter for handheld and console play... that alone would make me the happiest gamer in the world :)

[_-EDMIX-_]

Wii U

[_-EDMIX-_]

Be like " less games is better" 😂😂😂

[ziggurcat]

"No, Nintendo Doesn’t ‘Need’ Third Parties"

yes, it does. the Wii U is proof of that.

[KwietStorm_BLM]

That's like telling me to my face that I don't need third party games. Even by appeasing a subset of the market, that leaves many others out. If you're saying that's fine because they just don't care, well then that's why this has been such a hot topic around Nintendo for quite a few years at this point. How much money they have piled away doesn't serve me as a gamer.

[Sokol]

Tell that to the Wii u..

[Kosic]

Because it's going to be a second console to most gamers. Doesn't give a valid reason that Nintendo don't need the 3rd party support.

Because the ps4 may give the better graphic version of a 3rd party game. Nintendo will give the portability of that title...
So it's different strokes for different folks.

If the Switch doesn't get a decent 3rd party support over the Wii U, it won't be a console I'd purchase and I bet there's thousands of gamers who feel the same.

[MrSec84]

Even Wii U had Assassin's Creed, Batman, Mass Effect, a COD game and a few others at launch, despite all off those having new, recent releases Switch doesn't have it's own releases of any of those coming day one.

Despite development apparently being easy and quick on Switch it's not happening.
If developers really wanted to be there at launch they could have been.
Publishers understandably have no faith that their games will sell on a Nintendo console, so they're holding off and only making token releases to test the waters.

If Nintendo had their own awesome looking AAA exclusives, made for gamers who buy western AAA games and that audience jumped over to Switch to buy those games, then 3rd party publishers would see a reason to port their games to Switch.

Nintendo hasn't learned that this is why gamers buy PS4, along with a more diverse overall line-up of games.

[MrSec84]

Nintendo are calling the Switch a home console, it's releasing at a price point higher than the competition, so it needs to provide as many games as possible to make it worthwhile for people to buy the system and those reasons to buy will simply not be as great without 3rd party.

Even if you're the kind of gamer that already owns PS4 or XB1, the flexibility of a device that can travel with you gives you a reason to double dip on the games you really love and if you're yet to jump into the 8th gen, having more games on a platform that can travel with you is going to make it more likely that you'll buy that system.

With Switch Nintendo have even said themselves that they've been working with 3rd party to make it easy to put their games on it, Nintendo expects it to sell Wii like hardware numbers, it's definitely not intended to be a niche platform, so this article is flat out wrong in it's premise.

Switch in particular needs western targeted AAA 3rd party games, along with 1st party exclusives to draw that audience in to buy the system, along with games you'd usually find on Nintendo handheld gaming systems, to draw as many people towards Switch.

This constant insistence that Nintendo consoles only need Nintendo style core games, with some extra casual experiences is why Wii U failed, Switch needs to be cheaper and have all of the kinds of games Wii U missed out on, otherwise it's going to fail in a similar way.

[joab777]

Who would think it absurd for Bethesda or Rockstar to release a console that played only their games, and then they created a myriad of other titles around those characters but little else. Seeing as TES, Fallout and GTA are some of the best selling games of all time, who thinks they would be successful?

And to boot what if they chose the base specs needed for the hardware to run the games but charged as much or more than their competitors to purchase it? Who thinks this could work? Who would buy it if they couldn't play these games elsewhere? Would it be right?

[tontontam0]

LOL

The 3DS has many many many many many 3rd party games.

[superchiller]

Sure, they don't "need" third parties. And they don't "need" to succeed either, they can continue to bleed out money for another 5-10 years, until their assets are sold to the highest bidder.

[mzupeman]

The sentiment is lovely, but if Nintendo really wants this thing to actually sell... well, yes, they do. No, people by and large won't be playing each year's Call of Duty on this thing, but a large part of the 3DS's success was the fact that it has plenty of third party support. A lot of my favorite games on that platform are third party. A lot of the recommended best 3DS games of all time are third party.

Not to mention historically speaking, consoles with no real third party support just don't sell that well.

Yes, the hardcore fans will always want their Mario and Zelda no matter the cost. I'm one of them. But not needing third party? That's unrealistic.

[IAmLoki]

They don't because they already have many. The Nintendo SWITCH will be home to the best JRPGS to come and already we are seeing the strong support of it right off the bat. Indies will find themselves at home with the Switch as well. Nintendo will do amazing with third parties, and will still do amazing without the third party that don't want to release their games on the Switch. In that case, those third parties will be at bigger loss than Nintendo.

[Liqu1d]

Yes they do.

[Enigma_2099]

No, Nintendo doesn't need CRAP third parties. There's a difference. And seeing as how everyone's dogpiling them over a perceived lack of games, this statement comes off more as a set-up than an observation.

[PurpHerbison]

If Nintendo can actually steadily produce 1st party titles then sure, they don't need 3rd party. But yeah, lets be real, they need 3rd party.

[Sm3000]

Tell that to the wiiu

[Game-o-holic]

Um, ya. It will survive like the Wii U. Nintendo-heads will buy but will trickle down from there. We'll see.

[Cartman55125]

Because not having third-party developers has helped their system so much in the past...

[jmc8888]

Doesn't need? Wow.

Nintendo ABSOLUTELY needs it. It's what sells systems.

Niche products means niche amount of units sold.

One could say that if they can make money and a few million people are happy with a Nintendo only box, then they can maintain until another generation.

But Nintendo wants to make money for its shareholders, and on that note, the only way to do that well is to have 3rd party Western AAA games on a Nintendo system, and have those versions be as good or better then the competition (i.e. not the 6th best version).

People talk about portability, but most people, when they buy a console, aren't interested in portability if it screws the specs and raises the costs. That's what it did for Switch. The power of 2007-2008 for a higher price and less packed in stuff then Sony and MS. In some locales Switch is closing in on PS4 Pro price.

The funny and sad thing is.... if a competent Nintendo system was actually made, it would greatly enhance Nintendo's own vision, while allowing all the other devs to do so too. That system could of been had for $299, and ran stuff like BOTW at 1080/60 at higher fidelity levels. It might not have been a PS4 Pro level, but it definitely could have had ~3 TFlops and been close to Pro.

Instead we got a Nintendo box, with portability that few care for, and unlike Wii U, is starting off with almost no 3rd party as compared to 26 boxed 3rd party games at Wii U launch. Including Call of Duty, Assassin's Creed, Batman, Mass effect, etc, etc.

Also it's looking like the Network is coming in hot, like what was done with Wii U.

How can people just not understand... they could of given the devs what they wanted and given Nintendo's own coders a lot more power to work with. A device that would of been interesting to ANY gamer, instead of a NICHE, and cost the same. It's just amazing some people are in denial.

There's also NO reason there couldn't of been a portable version that could run the same platform, so if some devs wanted to do a Switch like thing, they could have.

Do people not realize that when 3rd party games get sold on their device, they get a cut? So say Call of Duty sells 5 million on a Nintendo platform... that literally would be about $50 million in fees given to Nintendo. Not only do 3rd party games sell consoles, but they provide a great revenue stream from the fees. (for example $50 million would be equivalent to selling 167,000 Switch's... except unlike a Switch being sold, ALL $50 MILLION WOULD BE PURE PROFIT with ZERO bill of materials. Whatever the amount is, across all 3rd party games, it would be huge.) On top of that, all those extra people who bought a Nintendo console, would then be customers that can buy Nintendo's own IP's... the Mario's, Zelda's, etc.

Nintendo would make a lot more money, and produce better experiences, if they simply made hardware that is available to be made for a competitive price.