Nintendo and their third parties

Nintendo Now writes: Over the past 3 years Nintendo Now has been noticing that more and more developers continue to complain about sales on the Wii. Big budget exclusives like, The Conduit, Mad World, and the previously mentioned Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles have all sold somewhat mediocre. Although High Voltage Software didn't complain about the sales of The Conduit, they seemed somewhat satisfied, Wii owners still realized it didn't sell as well as High Voltage made it out to be. I've come to notice some things about all of Nintendo's 3rd party developers.

[Blaze929]

I don't think it'll get as worse as the 3rd party support on the Gamecube (hopefully not). But yeah it's getting crazy. Good read

[JasonXE]

Lets HOPE it doesnt get as bad as the Gamecube's support. Ulgh

[ProA007]

I don't think third party support will drop off fully, but their investment into the mature games will. Granted Wii will never have 3rd party support to match 360/PS3 but it doesn't mean they can't succeed to some degree at least. Ubisoft is doing ok on there.

Also, it's not just The Conduit either. As they mentioned, Dead Space Extraction failed miserably too, as did MadWorld.

[KiwiSplodgeFace]

It's a shame that Dead Space and MadWorld didn't fare well, because they're not that bad. Guess the Wii just isn't the right platform for those kind of games.

[A Cupcake for Gabe]

The games that suffer the most are Nintendo's primary games outside Mario series and teen-adult 3rd party games. I really believe the way idiots like Reggie marketed it as a family console. Now when really good games come out for the Wii, they flop to the bargain bin while BABYZ and PUPPY LUV and Fairy Princess Pinball(not real names, hypothetical) top chartz.

Hate me on this but I blame Nintendo of America. Nintendo isn't winning awards with Flash games in Japan, they actually buy real games.

I see the Wii really taking a blow this year with Sony/MS's motion. Which brings 3D, True 1:1, and full body motion controlling.

[ChickeyCantor]

" Hate me on this but I blame Nintendo of America. Nintendo isn't winning awards with Flash games in Japan, they actually buy real games. "

Well...Japan has been more open to games for years.

[A Cupcake for Gabe]

yeah true. it's ridonkulous that American Wii gamers buy crappy casual games 100:1 over actually great titles.

[Mahr]

"I don't think it'll get as worse as the 3rd party support on the Gamecube (hopefully not)."

It won't get as bad as the Gamecube's non-existent third party support, but something that Wii owners should probably start accepting is that small, hopefully well-designed, games like De Blob or Lost Winds are going to be the face of non-Nintendo Wii games in the near future; there's not going to be much in the way of third party games from massively-popular franchises with major budgets and traditional gameplay styles.

This year's going to be solid, but regardless of how well something like Monster Hunter 3 does or does not do, we're not going to be seeing anything remotely like it next year, or especially the year after.

And the year after that is really a moot point, seeing as how the Mayans said the world is ending in 2012 anyway. Real bummer, that.

[A Cupcake for Gabe]

I loved deBlob. I really wished it came to the PS3 though. Games like MadWorld, deBlob, No More Heroes(Coming to PS3/360..yeah!) should be in true HD.

EDIT: At the disagreer. You're right. Games like this should always look like sh1t in sh1tty SD.

[rambi80]

The Mayans and many early cultures view time as cyclic - where patterns repeat over each cycle.
Hence they described one cycle that ended in 2012 and saw no need to go further.

Modern cultures view time as linear and hence many think that if they did not go beyond 2012 - then that is when the world ends.

They are mistaken

[Mahr]

Thank goodness.

[rambi80]

@Mahr

Well i could be wrong - But i'm comforted by the fact that if i am - i won't be held accountable - Kinda like Patcher :)

[Seferoth75]

@rambi,They tacked another celestial body in the heavens. We track the earths rotation around the su, they tacked something else in the heavens that had a much longer cycle. It's no different than our Calendar hitting Dec 31, the next day it just starts all over. Same thing with their calendar only it takes a lot longer to run out and start over.

[rambi80]

^^^
Thanks - i think its an axis created by scorpio and libra or aquarius - cant remember which.

Apparently it lines up with the axes of the earth at this date.

It was alluded to by Nostradamus also - i didn't want to get into all that :)

[Mahr]

We're getting somewhat off-topic here, but there's a great article on Cracked about this sort of thing if you google "cracked.com" and "apocalypse theories".

I'd link to it myself, but the url contains a swear word that apparently makes N4G very sad.

[Triella]

Nintendo fans buy Nintendo consols to play Nintendo games, the new casuals crowd they cater to tend to only play games with Wii in the title : Wii Play ,Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort, Wii fit, etc. or lookalikes with "cute" characters on the box art, Carnival Games, comes to mind.

If you look at the 30 Wii top sellers all are Nintendo or family safe games. And this situation is entirely Nintendo's fault : had they not massively advertised the Wii as a family console, they could have regain the support from third parties they lost in the N64 area. But Nintendo being Nintendo, they always want the profits to go in their pokets first to the expense of other developpers.

[Crazybone126]

I agree, if this gets as bad as the Gamecube i don't think people will stick around to see Wii 2

[Gr81]

Because Third Parties games are the key reason to own a Wii.

[fr0sty]

Third parties have never had any luck with the Wii. Wii has been ninty's console pretty much. they needed that however, all of this profit they're making is giving them lots to invest into their future, so the next nintendo console will likely be able to match or beat it's competition feature for feature.

[ChickeyCantor]

Lets be honest here.
People have been crying Nintendo isnt making any games.
Sounds to me like that was their cue, and by that i mean the point where Third party developers did something awesome for the Wii. Heh who am i kidding.

Het what can we say? If its not problem a then it must be problem b.

[ZoidsRaven]

Big budget? LMFAO That explains why NONE of those games are ten hours long. Funny a** read. 7_7

EDIT: Third parties can wipe their a**es with the money they are using to develop these Wii games. Unless what happened to Factor5 happens to one of these Wii developers, third parties can't say crap.

[hatchimatchi]

Good article.

[Crazybone126]

I want to thank the people who liked the article I wrote.

Also No More Heroes is only going to the PS3 and 360 in Japan. United States and Europeans got their chance to play the game, and it was on the Wii, Japanese players didn't get the chance to play.

[hatchimatchi]

dang, i didn't know the ps3 port wasn't getting released in the states. Hopefully theres english subs. I'll get the import.

[tunaks1]

umm, NMH was released in Japan,
putting it on the 360&PS3 for japan? i can understand the PS3 part but 360????

[Crazybone126]

Yeah Tunaks don't ask why they made such a decision but that's the way it is.

[tunaks1]

japan only, well if someone doesnt have a wii, they could always import.

[Seferoth75]

I think this was a very poor article. With a little work the author could have used this to show the truth and not add to the myth.

Let's look at the sales of these games he speaks of
Conduit 380k
Madworld 400k
RE UC 1.19 million
Re DC 300k

Just compare to other consoles like PS3
Lair 390k
Dark Sector 350k
Blazblue 270k
Ninja Gaiden 2 450k

Yes DC bombed I guess. Maybe because Capcom promised better support and a real RE game if gamers bought UC which you can tell from sales they did just that. and Dead space for PS3 only hit 890k. Considering how they butchered it for Wii they should be happy with the 210k they got so far.

I think a Wii site should work on proving false myths wrong. Not trying to back them up.

[hatchimatchi]

all you did was take 4 third party titles that didn't sell insane amounts on the ps3.

Lair is a complete mess
blaz blue is a niche fighting game
dark sector is a crap game that goes for $7 at gamestop
ninja gaiden sigma 2 is a port of a year old 360 game that came out 2 weeks before uncharted 2.

The only game that was expected to be amazing was Lair. All these wii games that didn't sell extremely well (with an install base of 60 million) were being hyped to no end.

It was a good article. You just have a hard time reading anything that speaks ill of the wii.

[Crazybone126]

You're exactly right. These Wii games were hyped to be somewhat ON PAR with PS3/360 games yet they've sold so much lower.

[Voice_of_Reason]

There are always excuses kid. Niche games do not sell big numbers on PS3 but they should sell billions on Wii? That just sounds like a fanboy statement.

You have excuses for every PS3 game that bombs but you do not and will not accept any reason for why the 10th on rail shooter for Wii bombs?

Lair was hyped big as a PS3 game, its failure is no excuse. Especially if you are trying to claim that Madworld, Conduit, RE on rails are any where close to the same budget and level of quality.

Madworld 5 hours long, black and white, no replay value and no support from publisher.Niche title you know like the one that only got 270k on PS3 by the above post?

Conduit Good game hit by media Wii hate and haters like you.So many sites said it was a mediocre game but now you promise it AAA must own because you need it to be in order to justify your hate. Pretty sure Lair got even higher reviews but of course you are okay with it bombing because it is on your console of choice

UC on rails shooter got over 1 million in sales. That beats a hell of a lot of higher budget games on PS3 in sales.

If you cannot be fair then you probably should not be in the Wii section.

Sorry but pulling up the niche excuse for a 2d fighter while trashing another just as niche title only proves you are bias.

[hatchimatchi]

I'm one of the "few" that went out and bought the conduit, darkside chronicles, dead space extraction & madworld.

Go back and read the post again.

Seferoth was pulling titles that were never expected to sell large quantities, except for Lair, which i pointed out was a complete failure. Lots of these 3rd party games bombing on the wii are the same titles that get hyped and are expected to show that the wii has a "core" audience.

I'm not even defending the games. All those games I listed for the wii are crap, except for darkside chronicles and even with that I enjoy umbrella chronicles more.

All you did was prove my point that some people go out of their way to defend their console of choice. The only one being biased is you.

Because i'm labeled a troll, i'll post a picture of my collection. I don't why I bother though because i'll still get labeled a troll by the nintendo purists here.

[EvilTwin]

Bringing back the "Seal of Quality" isn't going to magically make third parties market Wii games the way they do with PS3 or 360 games. For some reason, they just don't want to put the cash into it. No third party has put out any AAA-level title commensurate in quality with their HD console releases (MH:Tri might be the only one), either.

One part that should've been edited in that article:

"Big budget exclusives like, The Conduit, Mad World, and the previously mentioned Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles have all sold somewhat mediocre."

Conduit and MadWorld were NOT big budget. TCon was pretty much self-funded by a tiny indie developer. MadWorld was a 6-hour long, black-and-white, 480i brawler made while Platinum was putting most of their resources toward Bayonetta.
RE:DC, OTOH, looks like it had a healthy dose of polish put on it. Too bad it was on a rail shooter than got zero marketing.

[hatchimatchi]

It's real easy now to go and say how The Conduit, Madworld & god knows how many other wii games weren't "big budget" after we all witnessed the failure that the majority of them were. No one was stopping and saying, "Now wait guys, the development funding for this game isn't very high, let's not get ahead of ourselves..." when the games were being hyped to no end by ign and other game sites.

I come here and read an article about 3rd parties not putting in proper effort in their games or advertising for the wii & how bringing back the seal of quality standards would help cut down on bugs and glitches released within games. It's way more difficult on the wii to get patches and updates after the game is out in stores than it is for the ps3/360. With reinforced quality standards it could cut down on problems like, hmmmm MONO sound in a freaking music based game (gh3) & GAME ENDING glitches in Tomb Raider Underworld.

I read this article though and then I see in the comment section a bunch of insecure cry babies posting a bunch of numbers or comparing 3rd party wii efforts to those of other systems. Good god, the guy wasn't bashing the wii, all he was saying was what most people already know. This place amazes me with the lengths people will go to when it comes to their console of choice.

[Vortex3D]

Most Wii owners are kids, family or casual gamers. Most of the games in the article are M rated or hardcore games.

This is where Wii's success became the failure for Nintendo. How many hardcore gamers really on Wii compared to PS3 or X360?

I know more people owning a Wii than PS3 or X360 and not a single one cares about any of those games. Personally I do, but that shows I'm one out of the very few on everyone else I know that owns a Wii.

Does Nintendo really care if M rated and hardcore Wii games really sell? I don't think so because Nintendo keeps saying that want more of those games and yet they do nothing to help the game publishers that make those games.

In a way, Nintendo is stuck in their own image that sells so well. Wii is about casual, kids and family friendly game console. If Nintendo starts to push too hard to help promote M rated and hardcore games, they would contradict their own image.

[Voice_of_Reason]

If nobody cared about those games they would not have sold at all.

Please show me these highly rated M games that Nintendo should be helping with. All I see are mediocre games get the sales they deserve.

If Nintendo is smart and they obviously are, they will help on AAA games that deserve the sales like they are with Monster Hunter, and letting the companies that are using their worst teams to make Wii games deal with their own problems because its their fault.

Conduit isnt rated M and it isnt hard enough to be hardcore game

Madworld is bloody but its not hardcore, just a 5 hour button smasher that anyone can beat. Just because it has blood doesnt mean its hardcore. The Wii fanbase is oldschool gamers. Hardcore games to them are ones that require challenge.

And as far as on rails shooters go. Wii owners have Hotd 1 & 2, Overkill, Umbrella Chronicles, Ghost Squad, MoH Heroes had that as well, Dead Space, Darkside Chronicles, target Terror, Arcade Shooter, The list goes on dude. That genre is over saturated on Wii.Way too many point and shoot games where you do not control your character.

[hatchimatchi]

the debate isn't with games being rated M, when people say mature or hardcore they usually just mean titles that the typical gamer wants to play.

The wii doesn't have a lack of M rated games, what it has is a lack of games worth playing.

[Vizion26]

Big budget games like Madworld and The Conduit? There are many Gamecube games with bigger budgets and more importantly better gameplay. I have Madworld because I fail for the hype. The extremely repetitive and short. The game would have sold worse on the HD twins. The only reason why it got so much internet hype because it's extreme violence which a lot of gamers equate with mature (it's ridiculous on what pass for mature gaming these days).

Third parties put half hearted effort into Wii games it will reflect in the sales chart. 3rd parties seem to think Wii owners are dumb so when they put some half hearted game on Wii - a game would have surely flopped on the HD twins - they expect it to light up the charts since most other 3rd party Wii games are shovelware.

The only company that truly respects Wii owners is Nintendo and that's reflected in their sales numbers (totally dominated December).

No More Heroes 2 and Tatsunuko vs Capcom look like solid efforts - something you would expect on the HD twins - so I would expect good sales for each game.

[lizard81288]

i heard in japan, they advertise more 3rd party games, while in America, they advertise more casual game, like on the nintendo channel for example. in japan they show more "hardcore"/3rd party games on the Nintendo Channel, but here in the US, they show more casual games.

i agree with the advertising area, so true.I'm surprised TvC has a tv add. it starts airing monday, although its already up on the youtubes. the only one out of the 3 i care about is capcom, the other 2, not so much (Sega and Ubi) but games like TvC and Monster Hunter Tri should sell quite well on the wii. MHT was a big hit in japan.

i'm also glad they(target and others) are stopping the mass amounts of shovelware games being let in. the DS also has it really bad too. at my local target, the DS has 2 cases, and 1 and a half cases was filled with petz,dogz,catz, and everything under the sun by ubi. the wii had a better selection of games than the DS. then there was that small half that actually had games, BUT they were the old ones, like starfy, M&L2,M&L3, new super mario bros, and older games.