Nintendo Wii-U 3rd Party Support
Nintendo is among the top in the world for gaming. Having brought the NES, SNES, N64, Gameboy and other popular consoles into the households of millions,Nintendo’s profile is acclaimed and respected. Consoles sell themselves with games from Mario, Donkey Kong, Metroid, Kirby,The Legend of Zelda, Animal Crossing, Pokemon and countless others. Despite their strength and household name, the company has had one serious criticism since the N64 days.
Having once been known for attracting quality third party developers with its Nintendo Seal of Approval, the company began losing large amount of support and as a result consumers lost a variety in their selection. Nintendo’s staple franchises can sell the consoles themselves, but many market studies show that despite Nintendo’s Wii unit selling the most of the major 3 consoles, it also had the least amount of play time.
This problem arose from a lack of support in the 3rd party developers, which led to fewer games being available for gamers when a big Nintendo first party game wasn’t hitting the shelves. For several generations in a row now, Nintendo has spoke of increased 3rd party support, which at times have seen some surges, but it always fades off and leaves people asking the same question the next go around.
Now that the Nintendo Wii-U is near release, the question once again appears, will Nintendo get 3rd party support? Already the console is showing some signs of life. Mass Effect is porting over to Nintendo after the first 2 installments in the series skipped them altogether. Batman Arkum Asylum is also joining the Wii-U for the first time. Over the previous generation we saw Call of Duty have some trimmed down versions hit the Wii, but with the addition of a centralized online network, it can be expected that such powerhouse franchises may make their way over to the Wii-U as well. Ubisoft also showed off ZombiU at this year’s E3, showing not only a transfer of franchises to the Wii-U, but the creation of new franchises as well.
While it is still early, it is looking like Nintendo’s Wii-U may indeed see a revitalization of development support for this generation. They showed themselves as being able to push consoles into households and with easier to develop on consoles this upcoming generation, and signs of being willing to adjust their product and network for others, they could see an uplift in support.
What do you think? Will Nintendo redeem themselves with third party support? What games would you like to see come to Nintendo platforms?
