Third Party Wii Games Aren't Selling

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=179648

OF COURSE THEY AREN'T SELLING YOU FOOL!

Nintendo doesn't WANT them to sell! It's their entire business model. They don't want anything to do with third parties because it would take too much attention away from Mario and Link.

And what's with "I thought there would be more games for hardcore gamers... I didn't know the Wii would be mainly targeted at non-gamers."

What are you an idiot? I lived in Tokyo... I know you can get Good Morning America and The Today Show over there if you want to. (And if you plan on making a game for a system that's appeared on those shows... you want to.)


GAAAAAAH!

(End overtly negative and biased rant.)

Well plus who wants to develop for a system where 90% of your profits go to pay Nintendo licensing fees. Games that do come out are usually ports that were developed for another system.

You can't blame Nintendo for this. Seeing as how you don't have a Wii I wouldn't expect you to understand but aside from the Resident Evil games, all the 3rd party games have SUCKED and I mean not just a little. They amount up to little more than DS ports or flash based mini game translations. Then the games that also come out on PS3 and 360, the Wii just can't measure up to those.

Nintendo would be best served to go out and say to the 3rd party devs: "look, you're giving us a bad name, we're going to start QAing your games and if they don't measure up to our standards then you're not releasing them."

Nintendo did this in the early days of the NES and then after it became wildly popular they started letting anybody make any crappy game they wanted and dumping it onto a cart to sell for $30-$40.

The most played Wii game I own is Wii Sports. I have had mine since launch. I'm sooo very let down by Nintendo for this. But then again as a former gamecube owner, how the hell did I not see this coming.

It's a shame since it had the most potential of any of the nextgen consoles. I don't mean potential in the narrow sense intended by hardcore gamers, but where are all of the new 'Brain Trainings', 'Guitar Heroes' and 'Wii Sports' that girls and older gamers could be playing. It's almost like somebody senior in Nintendo realised that something innovative was going on and decided to clamp down.

While people ***** and moan about crappy 3rd party titles, I've been having a blast playing Zack and Wiki, SSX Blur, Super Swing Golf and others. I'm also not buying groceries this month so I can buy No More Heroes on Monday. Yeah, Suda, I'm looking forward to it! Moreso than food.

The problem here is not that 3rd party games suck, it's that there is so much damned shovelware on the system it's not even funny anymore. Minigame collections are crap, but people who aren't like us (i.e. non-gamers) buy them 'cause they're looking for the Wiisports lightning to strike again, or they're looking for something cheap to shut their whiny kids the hell up.

Nintendo had a similar problem back in the day, as outlined by Fudge, and took measures. In the end, though, those measures ended up hurting them and they lost a lot of business near the end of the SNES era, and they've been playing catch-up with the 3rd party devs ever since. They're starting to make up ground though. Squeenix is slowly warming to them again, MMV still has Project O in the pipe, Arc System Works already has Guilty Gear XX out. Basically, we're still just a year in. The shovelware may not stop, but the quality titles will increase in number.

I don't think junk 3rd party games/shovelware is really much of a problem. Every successful console since…Atari? Further back? Anyway, they've all had droves of shovelware. The more popular the system, the more it had.

It's unfortunate that some people end up wasting money on a game they don't enjoy, but it just ends up requiring consumers to be better educated. Get referrals, do research, rent first…even the retail stores do a certain kind of filtering that eliminates some of the junk (and occasionally something good.)

What matters is the good titles and consumers being aware of those good titles.


I'm sure Nintendo does in fact genuinely want as many good 3rd party games as they can get. They've just not positioned themselves to attract them very well post-SNES. Whether that comes from royalty fees, media costs (N64 carts), lack of special incentives, lack of installed hardware base, company/product image, relative hardware/network capabilities…whatever might be or have been the case… Don't mistake ineptitude for lack of desire.

But the point you're missing is that developers don't WANT to develope good third party games for Nintendo. First of all: They won't really make any money if they do. And second: It's not worth the effort to program something specifically for the wiimote and the nunchuck.

I've said this before but this WILL kill them in the end. Publisher's just end up sending their third banana teams in to make crap games that may get them a buck or two if only because there aren't any other games for people to play for six months once they've beaten mario or zelda or whatever.

I knew this was going to happen because it's the only thing that COULD happen with Nintendo's demented business model. Now just watch an instant replay of the Gamecube.

I'm pretty sure the Wii will outsell the GC. I mean it's nearly there now....

http://vgchartz.com/hwcomps.php?con...3=N64&reg3=All&start=32621&end=39460&weekly=1

Yep, so only 65 new games will be coming out for the wii in the 1st half of 2008, and "only" 61 are 3rd party releases.

Where there are sold consoles, developers will follow.

http://gaming.monstersandcritics.co...hp/Nintendo_to_roll_out_145_new_games_by_July

Jan. 07: Kidz Sports Ice Hockey (Destineer)
Jan. 08: Harvey Birdman: Attorney at Law (Capcom)
Jan. 15: Samurai Warriors: Katana (KOEI)
Jan. 15: Furu Furu Park (Majesco Entertainment)
Jan. 21: Endless Ocean (Nintendo)
Jan. 22: One Piece: Unlimited Adventure (Namco)
Jan. 29: Bomberman Land (Hudson)
Jan. -- : No More Heroes (Ubisoft)
Jan. -- : CSI: Crime Scene Investigation: Hard Evidence (Ubisoft)
Feb. 08: Kawasaki Jet Ski (Destineer)
Feb. 11: Go Diego Go!: Safari Rescue (2K Play)
Feb. 12: WWII Aces (Destineer)
Feb. 12: Dream Pinball 3D (SouthPeak Games)
Feb. 18: MX vs. ATV Untamed (THQ)
Feb. 25: Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None (DreamCatcher)
Feb. 26: Baroque (Atlus USA)
Feb. 26: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrors (Square Enix)
Feb. 27: Kidz Sports Soccer (Destineer)
Feb. 27: London Taxi: Rush Hour (Destineer)
Feb. -- : Garfield Gets Real (DSI Games)
Feb. -- : Yamaha Supercross (DSI Games)
Feb. -- : Karaoke Revolution Presents: American Idol Encore (Konami)
Feb. -- : Brothers in Arms: Road to Hill 30 (Ubisoft)
Feb. -- : Balloon Pop (UFO Interactive Games)
Mar. 03: Destroy All Humans: Big Willy Unleashed (THQ)
Mar. 09: Super Smash Bros. Brawl (Nintendo)
Mar. 10: Worms: A Space Oddity (THQ)
Mar. 25: Okami (Capcom)
Mar. 25: Opoona (KOEI)
Mar. -- : MiniCopter: Adventure Flight (Aksys Games)
Mar. -- : Alone in the Dark (Atari)
Mar. -- : Ninja Reflex (Electronic Arts)
Mar. -- : Obscure: The Aftermath (Ignition)
Mar. -- : Target: Terror (Konami)
Mar. -- : Nitro Bike (Ubisoft)
Mar. -- : Emergency Heroes (Ubisoft)
Mar. -- : Heavenly Guardian (UFO Interactive Games)
Mar. -- : Rebel Raiders (XS Games)
Apr. 15: Castle of Shikigami III (Aksys Games)
Apr. -- : Pro Evolution Soccer (Konami)
Apr. -- : Wild Earth: African Safari (Majesco Entertainment)
Apr. -- : The Monkey King: The Legend Begins (UFO Interactive Games)
Apr. -- : Super Pick Ups (XS Games)
May 06: Speed Racer (Warner Bros. Games)
May 13: The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (Disney)
May -- : BlastWorks: Build, Trade, Destroy (Majesco Entertainment)
May -- : King of Fighters: The Orochi Saga (SNK Playmore)
May -- : The Dog Island (Ubisoft)
Jun. 08: Wonderworld Amusement Park (Majesco Entertainment)
Jun. -- : Catch of the Day (Electronic Arts)
Jun. -- : Ford Racing Off Road (Empire Interactive)
Jun. -- : Cooking Mama Cook Off 2 (Majesco Entertainment)
Jun. -- : Rygar: The Battle of Argus (Tecmo, Inc.)
Jun. -- : DeBlob (THQ)
Jun. -- : Wall-E (THQ)
Spring: Mario Kart Wii with Wii Wheel (Nintendo)
Spring: Major League Baseball 2K8 (2K Sports)
Spring: Don King Presents: Prizefighter (2K Sports)
Spring: Top Spin 3 (2K Sports)
Spring: Kung Fu Panda (Activision)
Spring: LEGO: Indiana Jones (LucasArts)
Summer: Deca Sports (Hudson)
Summer: Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (LucasArts)
Summer: Active Life: Outdoor Challenge (Namco Bandai)
Q2: Wii Fit (Nintendo)

Nintendo WANTs third party games, as well as their own. Third party is where they make a good amount of money, thanks to Licensing fees and whatnot.

And I don't see how its failing when it is selling os many units... unless you're an SDF agent in disguise.

Okay, so 61 3rd party games.... I'm hoping that at least 15 are good and exclusive because if it's available for all 3 systems the Wii would be my last choice.

SunRedRX7 said:

Yep, so only 65 new games will be coming out for the wii in the 1st half of 2008, and "only" 61 are 3rd party releases.

Where there are sold consoles, developers will follow.

http://gaming.monstersandcritics.co...hp/Nintendo_to_roll_out_145_new_games_by_July

Click to expand...

Yeah. This is exactly the kind of BS we're talking about: Bomberman, Worms, and another Ford title. Maybe yet another horrible attempt to bring King of Fighters into 3D. It's the third and fourth string interns at the dev studios putting out their bare minimum.

FudgeNuggets said:

I'm pretty sure the Wii will outsell the GC. I mean it's nearly there now....

http://vgchartz.com/hwcomps.php?con...3=N64&reg3=All&start=32621&end=39460&weekly=1

Click to expand...

Who gives a damned about the Gamecube? The way people are talking "Oh if you sell enough consoles developers will rush to make exclusives for your system... even though people who play games aren't really the ones buying the system."...the way people are talking Wii's software sales should be beating the 360 and PS3's combined.

But I've said since the begining this will never... ever... EVER happen... no matter how many consoles Nintendo sales, because 3rd party developers will never get a major return on the kind of investment it takes to make exclusive, or even port major (a la Call of Duty 4, The Orange Box, Bioshock, etc... etc) games for the Wii.

My only point about the Gamecube wasn't that the Wii wouldn't make more money... but that it would be rendered obsolete and in third place just as fast.

But Fudge as you have hinted at before, you are a geek, not one of the untappable market.
They don't need exclusives from major franchises so much as new low budget games that are polished and innovative.

Well, you did mention the GameCube....... but I digress.

I'm not arguing the point of lack of quality 3rd party games, I mean take your examples: BioShock, Orange Box and COD4. IF you had all 3 systems like me which one would you NOT buy it for? My answer is the Wii because of the crappy friend codes but moreso because of the comparatively crappy graphics. We need less of Cooking Mama, Mii oriented and minigame oriented games and more good games like Resident Evil, Mario, Zelda and Metroid.

The Excitebike/Exitetruck sequel looks good, SSBB looks good, maybe Rygar if it is exclusive and Mario Kart but nothing else really floats my boat on that list.

FudgeNuggets said:

I'm not arguing the point of lack of quality 3rd party games, I mean take your examples: BioShock, Orange Box and COD4. IF you had all 3 systems like me which one would you NOT buy it for? My answer is the Wii because of the crappy friend codes but moreso because of the comparatively crappy graphics. We need less of Cooking Mama, Mii oriented and minigame oriented games and more good games like Resident Evil, Mario, Zelda and Metroid.

Click to expand...

If I wanted to play "BioShock, Orange Box and COD4" I would have bought a 360 or PS3. Most Wii owners are not typical gamers.

>HyperlogiK< said:

They don't need exclusives from major franchises so much as new low budget games that are polished and innovative.

Click to expand...

>HyperlogiK< said:

But Fudge as you have hinted at before, you are a geek, not one of the untappable market.
They don't need exclusives from major franchises so much as new low budget games that are polished and innovative.

Click to expand...

Not gonna happen. At least none of the low budget innovative 3rd party games will be any good. And if they are good they probably won't sell... for the same reason No More Heroes has sold poorly in Japan thus far which is:

SunRedRX7 said:

I would have bought a 360 or PS3. Wii owners are not typical gamers.

Click to expand...

That's the problem.

FudgeNuggets said:

The Excitebike/Exitetruck sequel looks good, SSBB looks good, maybe Rygar if it is exclusive and Mario Kart but nothing else really floats my boat on that list.

Click to expand...

No More Heroes should, as should Okami (yeah, it's a port, but drawing with the Wiimote won't be nearly as laborious as drawing with thumbsticks. Gone are the days of 'dammit, my cherry bomb didn't work! Dammit, my mask looks like a pile of *** and fail, dammit, why won't the tree bloom!?). DeBlob looks like all kinds of awesome fun. Opoona looks great, too. Star Wars: TFU might be alright, too.

I think lots of people write just about every 3rd party title off like it's shovelware when that's hardly the case.

Rainless, I TRIPLE DOG DARE YOU to go out and play Zack and Wiki and tell me it's not fun. TRIPLE. DOG. DARE! If you go and buy it and can honestly tell me that it is not fun or challenging, I will buy it off of you. You will get your money back.

SunRedRX7 said:

Most Wii owners are not typical gamers.

Click to expand...

I fixed it for you.

ok as far with 3rd party games i like my copies of red steel and metal slug anthology, but there are alot of crappy games out there

I didn't realize No More Heroes was an exclusive, I know you're salivating over that one and I'll give it a try too. Okami is not my kind of game. I will be getting TFU for the 360 not the Wii and at your suggestion I shall make Zack and Wiki my next game rental....