WiiWare devs speak out on lacking support from Nintendo

Did anyone see the trailer from the pic? Sickening...

Kind of what sucks about developing any games for Nintendo, they rarely help you.

They -really- need to change that attitude.

I'm sure Nintendo laughed as it kept swimming in money.

Seriously though, I doubt Nintendo gives a crap while they keep printing money with Wii Play, NSMB and all that.

I don't know. Nintendo has some master plan. I can't say what yet. But they figured out the "make money" piece of it quickly.

Wiiware has tons of great games, but no one knows about it. Even the hardcore thinks there are no games on Wiiware compare to Xbox Live or PSN.

In fact, since around the end of last year, Xbox Live and PSN pretty much devoid of any new games, while Wiiware keeps on having great games like Castlevania Rebirth, Excitebike World Rally, Phoenix Wright, Pokemon Rumble, Bit Trip Void, Chrono Twins, Muscle March etc. But no one knows about them, and the media never talk about them, let alone review them. (yet sites like 1up or Gamespot rather take the time to review Xbox Live games that no one ever heard of)

Nintendo don't need third parties, so they don't have to court them. I love the DS, but the success of that and the Wii seem to have put them back into their arrogant pre-N64 mindset.

Does seem like something they would be up to, though i'll contend that they do support the really good stuff (World of Goo got a huge push from them), much like they do in the console space, though unlike in the console space, the good stuff is largely being provided by third parties, and not by Nintendo (though World Rally and Pokemon Rumble are good starts).

Of the three, Nintendo supports their third parties the least. But hell, at least they haven't returned to outright publically humiliating them again like the CES when Final Fantasy 64 was first shown. So at least devs have THAT going for them. For now anyway... Reggie and Cammie have gotten awfully snappy lately at third parties.

@billysea,

I hate to drive your point to the ground but half of your list came out last year. And another is a lazy port. Also, the fuck if Media doesn't talk about them. Every Monday. Front page. This site. The full breakdown of what it went up. If you want something more in depth, put your own money down. Go ahead. Because most of these sites often do quicklooks based around demos. Do you think gameloft REALLY wants you demoing their $8 Me and My Puppies game? Noooo.... I wonder why?

But then look at Muscle March who's core gameplay (strike a pose) got tiresome on Warioware Smooth Moves, just completely fucked out weird enough that suddenly it's GOOD? Namco did their promoting for this though. Capcom, likewise, promoted Dark Void Zero. Maybe the reason why so few people KNOW about these games is because these companies are just dropping them on a service and hoping people buy them based solely on a two sentence description (see also: PSP Minis)? With Blogs and fansites more than willing to talk about any and all games, maybe Gameloft, the bulk of DSiWare releases, just needs to talk to the community instead of having your kind flood topics about Pixeljunk with "We have downloadable games too, guys."

w o w. w e h a v e s p a m m e r s a g a i n.

Stop selling your crap on the site.

Sometimes word of mouth can be better than advertising. I know I tell people all the time to buy World of Goo, Lost Winds, Swords & Soldiers, Megaman 10, and the Art Style games.

If your game is good enough, it'll find an audience.

I still don't see why it's Nintendo's responsibility to make sure every other third-party's game is well advertised. Don't they have their own advertising budgets to spend? My feeling on this is if you want something to succeed, you have to work at it yourself, not ask for handouts from others.

Yes, I know that Microsoft and Sony occasionally pay for advertising for third-parties (which is why they have those "exclusive" versions of commercials for multi-platform games), but they're directly going head-to-head with each other. The third-parties don't see Microsoft and Sony as their competitors (even though they technically are), as Micrsoft and Sony are going at each other's neck.

Nintendo beats to another drum, and the third-parties see Nintendo as a direct threat to their own games. "We can't sell our games, because Nintendo's own sell too good! Nintendo should pay for our advertising!" That's the noise I hear.

Yes, Nintendo could do more to make WiiWare and the Wii's online capabilities more profound... but I don't recall the last time I saw a commercial advertising an XBLA or PSN game.

If you think your game is worthy of success, you should advertise it yourself.

Nintendo is going to get themselves in the same financial problems they had during the N64/Gamecube era. The Wii is doing great now but Nintendo (like any other company) has finite resources and can develop only so many hit games. Third party support is absolutely necessary for long term success in the console industry. Especially when companies like Microsoft are catering to the SAME third party developers and thus acquiring their limited game developing resources.

Sheeesh are you like the energizer bunny.

You keep going and going and going and going......

Does seem kool

They're too busy counting their millions to care about anyone else. I say everyone should focus on the other platforms and let Nintendo do their own thing.

Nintendo have never been good at that kinda thing

Did you guys actually read what I wrote? I said "around the end" of last year, not the whole year.
Of course I know there are a lot of great games on XBLA and PSN. I played Flower, Shadow Complex, Trials HD, Fat Princess etc. But they were released earlier in the year.
The only games I remember being noticeable that were released around the end of the year on HD consoles were Gyromancers and PixelJunk Shooter.

Seems to me the Nintendo Channel they does a good bit to promote WiiWare releases. Every Nintendo Week episode previews all the downloadable games released that week. And each game gets at least an Info Video (aka trailer) added to the Channel when it comes out which links to the game's info page.

Everyone should buy NyxQuest: Kindred Spirits on WiiWare. That game is brilliant.