Could Nintendo Save Themselves with PC Releases?

[Caiphus]

Well, they wouldn't. Going to the PC would be truly last resort, I feel. It'd be good news for me, since I own a PC and do not own a Wii U, but they give literally zero fucks about me. And too right.

Whether it would improve their profit margin? Who knows. The games Nintendo makes don't lend themselves super well to the PC. 3D platformers and local multiplayer-focussed games aren't exactly the biggest hitters on Steam. Furthermore, Nintendo is rather paranoid when it comes to piracy. There's a good chance they'd use restrictive DRM, or would avoid Steam entirely in lieu of their own store. So there's that. They do make high quality games, though. And there's a large PC market out there, so it's difficult to say.

But yeah, it would be a pretty big sign that Nintendo had lost faith in their own product, and they just wouldn't do it.

 

[Bonk4licious]

http://kotaku.com/nintendo-thinks-free-to-play-is-hurting-their-business-1514943213

That recent article from Kotaku has one of their recent interviews, where Nintendo basically says they only like supporting their actual and current hardware, and not supporting virtual. So as much as I would be completely on board for this, we may just have to stick to the Dolphin emulator out there and downloading "completely legal owned copies" of those games online.

 

[The AmeriCanadian Gamer]

Imagine them selling on steam, then steamboxes would also be able to play nintendo games, think about that for a second I would get a cheap steambox for streaming games from my pc to my TV as well as playing nes/snes/n64 titles. Maybe even gamecube titles

I know an emulator can do all of that, but if its officially supported (and ported well) I think it would work. The Nintendo brand has a lot of power behind it.

 

[Double A]

It would make more since for Microsoft to sell there games on PC then Nintendo. They're 3 consoles in and they haven't made a profit on the Xbox brand. Fingers crossed that they finally get in the black with the X1 after selling the 360 and Xbox at a loss and the paying out for RRD.

They will never make a profit solely on an Xbox sale. Everyone who sells consoles does so at a loss so they can get it to the consumer as cheaply as possible, who will promptly spend tons and tons of money on games. They've made up their loss by a huge margin. It only takes two-ish games for them to start turning a profit on a customer.

 

[Something Amyss]

I know for some games it might not be feasible, like the ones that require 3D on the 3DS

There are pretty much no games that require 3D and, with the 2DS, that's likely to be the future.

Probably wont happen because they like forcing their customers to rebuy dlc games every time a new piece of hardware comes out. If they were to have a Virtual Console on the PC, then people would only have to buy a game ONCE...

They seem to have finally figured out that their fans are sick of that bullshit, but it will still be sometime before they rectify it...

Aren't they rectifying it this year with their new Steam/PSN idea?

I'm going to use some corporate bean counter knowledge with you for a second, so bear with me.

Why give the people an emulator on a PC when you could charge them $100-$500 for a new console and make more money that way?

That's not how I think, that's corporate logic for you. Anything for a quick buck.

Well, when you're losing money on each sale, and you don't have a big enough install base for software sales to make up for it....

I mean, that's the exact situation Nintendo's involved in right now, so I think it's a fair assessment.

I wouldn't expect them to do it with recent titles, but with older ones, like the VC library it could be smart. I'm not particularly sure the VC is a strong selling point of any modern console, so I don't think it'd detract from the console, either.

Of course, a fuller release of VC games might be a better move. A smarter pricing structure might be, as well.

 

[kilenem]

It would make more since for Microsoft to sell there games on PC then Nintendo. They're 3 consoles in and they haven't made a profit on the Xbox brand. Fingers crossed that they finally get in the black with the X1 after selling the 360 and Xbox at a loss and the paying out for RRD.

They will never make a profit solely on an Xbox sale. Everyone who sells consoles does so at a loss so they can get it to the consumer as cheaply as possible, who will promptly spend tons and tons of money on games. They've made up their loss by a huge margin. It only takes two-ish games for them to start turning a profit on a customer.

Except PS2 and the Majority of Nintendo platforms. Plus this generation the PS4 and X1 are being sold at a profit. That's why the tech in them is probably not bleeding edge. I remember when the 360 and PS3 came out they were pretty close to the PC.

 

[Something Amyss]

They will never make a profit solely on an Xbox sale. Everyone who sells consoles does so at a loss so they can get it to the consumer as cheaply as possible, who will promptly spend tons and tons of money on games. They've made up their loss by a huge margin. It only takes two-ish games for them to start turning a profit on a customer.

He's talking their division, not individual console sales. And it's true. Microsoft is still in an overall hole over the gaming division. This is why investors have wanted Microsoft out of gaming for a while.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

They will never do it simply because they can not control it the way they want too.

They will never make a profit solely on an Xbox sale. Everyone who sells consoles does so at a loss so they can get it to the consumer as cheaply as possible, who will promptly spend tons and tons of money on games. They've made up their loss by a huge margin. It only takes two-ish games for them to start turning a profit on a customer.

He's talking their division, not individual console sales. And it's true. Microsoft is still in an overall hole over the gaming division. This is why investors have wanted Microsoft out of gaming for a while.

Odd they started to make a profit off the the 360 a few years into it last I checked. (IE they paid off the debt of the Xbox launch and the 360's RROD )
=====
edit scratch that they did make a profit off the 360 but that's based on unit sales not overall debt to profit ratio.

 

[Lightknight]

Nintendo releasing on the PC would give them a boost in the short term. The same way as when Sega dropped consoles and started releasing on other consoles they instantly went from the deep red back into the black from then on out.

But the problem is that Nintendo wants to succeed in the home console market and there being Nintendo games on the PC would dilute the market for them and potentially sabotage their next launch.

So would it save them? I don't think anyone knows. It could turn a profit now and not really impact them by the next generation or it could turn a profit now and kill them later.

They aren't in danger right now. Not at the moment. They're just going to have a few crappy years in the console market and should eventually get a shot at redemption afterwards.

I will also point out, whether we like to admit it or not, that releasing a game on the pc often times drastically harms console sales thanks to the ease of piracy. This is one of the reasons that GTA 5 hasn't hit computers yet. It will likely be released (if ever), after they've released it on the PS4 and XBO.

 

[Worgen]

Probably wont happen because they like forcing their customers to rebuy dlc games every time a new piece of hardware comes out. If they were to have a Virtual Console on the PC, then people would only have to buy a game ONCE...

They seem to have finally figured out that their fans are sick of that bullshit, but it will still be sometime before they rectify it...

Are you sure you're not talking about sony and microsoft? Nintendo has been good about making their consoles backwards compatible. You could play gamecube games on the wii, you can play wii games on the wiiU, you can play ds games on the 3ds etc etc. They tend to make their systems backwards compatible with the last gen.

 

[FrozenLaughs]

Yes. 2 words:

Pokemon. MMO.


Look inside yourself, you know it to be true.

 

[Lightknight]

Yes. 2 words:

Pokemon. MMO.


Look inside yourself, you know it to be true.

Damn. Right to the heart of me.

 

[IamLEAM1983]

Realistically, no. The PC is a hotbed of piracy and homebrew content, and we all know what Nintendo's stance on the matter happens to be. As to what's been said above - a Pokemon MMO might garner them some cash, yes, but odds are they couldn't nab all that sweet World of Warcraft cash. Nintendo's always had a terrible time adapting to anything that it hasn't devised or constructed, so I doubt anyone at Ninty could wrap their heads around the intricacies of an MMO.

The most optimistic thing I can see happening is Nintendo choosing to exploit the App Store's potential, essentially playing Capcom and Squeenix at their own game. Not that we'll ever see a full-fledged SNES emulator endorsed by House Mario; but I'd wager a port of the major Mario and Zelda releases leading up to the N64 is in the realms of possibility.

Unfortunately, what's really likely is Ninty choosing to work on shitty companion apps, like some sort of Second Screen Experience bullshit, or uninspired Zynga or PopCap clones redressed as the core Nintendo franchises - all in order to promote some upcoming release for the console.

 

[Yopaz]

But here's another way of looking at it: Many of Nintendo's games are made for them by them and rarely if ever reach other consoles. The Nintendo development team could very easily release some of their games on other consoles and profit off of that without hurting themselves in the process.

Releasing on different console would cost them more in terms of licensing, more developers to work with the ports and fans would lose faith in the Nintendo brand and not buy their consoles (considering their sales right now that's not something they can afford) and on top of that, why buy a console with poor third party support when the games can be bought on different consoles? So yeah, it would cost them a lot. If they were to go third party they could end up losing their spot in the console market completely. Because of different requirements their costs would increase and there's no guarantee that the sales would in fact increase by a significant number.

That said if they were to release a Nintendo 64 emulator or some such for PC tied to a system kinda like Steam I can see them rolling in money. Porting games isn't incredibly hard, but it does take some money to get it done. Emulating just requires a good emulator and that is something a good developer team could bang out quite easily. Nintendo and digital distribution though... they could never muscle their way into the PC market unless they restructured their entire view on the internet. So I don't think Nintendo could save themselves this way. Nor do I think they need "saving" right now, but then again I have been wrong before.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Of course, a fuller release of VC games might be a better move. A smarter pricing structure might be, as well.

Oh absolutely.

Price restructuring would be a boon for the e-Shop.

The first big issue with e-Shop/Virtual Console games, is they are very, very overpriced.
The last e-shop title I bought was Fire Emblem: Awakening a little under a year ago, mostly because NOTHING ELSE is worth the cost they're asking. Not when I can just spend that same amount on Humble Bundle or GoG or Steam and get something much better.

The second huge issue is that VC titles aren't all tied to a unified account across all Nintendo platforms.
On the 3DS, games are tied to the device ID. So if 3DS is damaged or lost, tough luck, you just lost everything you (over)paid for. Creating a unified account system would bring Nintendo more into the modern "device-cluster" model similar to what their competition employs (it works for PSN already, never mind the booming smartphone and tablet game market).

The last big issue is this "keep-away" game Nintendo plays with software availability.

Nintendo has a large backlog of classic SNES titles people want that they're just sitting on (have the rights to).
And they know it. I've seen sufficiently functional SNES emulators run on weaker hardware already (I've seen original PSPs running ZSNES, FFS); they could make a mint if they made SNES VC games available on the 3DS.

They tried to artificially boost WiiU sales by announcing certain VC titles WiiU exclusive (I recall them advertising one of the Mother games as WiiU exclusive last year) or by offering certain titles for an extremely limited time (like they did very recently with the Zelda Anniversary 4-Sword Adventure title on 3DS).

Sufficed to say, the Keep-Away gambit hasn't worked and just pissed people off more than anything.

A unified account would end Nintendo's double-dipping scheme but it would also increase demand for their systems across the board; every 3DS owner would suddenly have a convenient pool of Virtual Console games they could access from a WiiU should they purchase one and link it to their account, and it would draw more attention to the e-Shop where they can sell more "niche" games like FE: Awakening without fear of overproduction costs biting them (again).

Honestly, it just blows my mind how they think RESTRICTING the sale of software would help them in their darkest hour.
Especially in an age where digital distribution is incredibly convenient and easy on every platform BUT Nintendo's.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

No it won't happen due to the attitudes companies in Japan have. If it did happen it wouldn't save them but it would be an initial cash flow with some constant streams around sale times. As for piracy on PCs. Well the only thing there is that companies think more piracy happens on PCs due to actually have closer to real data on the downloads. Saying PCs pirate more than consoles is silly since no one has the real numbers for either and only speculation.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Actually, they released Nintendo ID which can be transferred between 3DS systems.

Wow. I hadn't noticed.
Goes to show how often I've used my 3DS.

Well, good start for them.

 

[Something Amyss]

Oh absolutely.

Price restructuring would be a boon for the e-Shop.

The first big issue with e-Shop/Virtual Console games, is they are very, very overpriced.
The last e-shop title I bought was Fire Emblem: Awakening a little under a year ago, mostly because NOTHING ELSE is worth the cost they're asking. Not when I can just spend that same amount on Humble Bundle or GoG or Steam and get something much better.

THANK YOU!

I mean, for the price of Balloon Fight, I can get a much more robust experience on Steam, GoG, or even PSN. I can probably get several games on Humble Bundle if I don't feel like offering money to charity. Aaaaaaaaand....

The second huge issue is that VC titles aren't all tied to a unified account across all Nintendo platforms.
On the 3DS, games are tied to the device ID. So if 3DS is damaged or lost, tough luck, you just lost everything you (over)paid for. Creating a unified account system would bring Nintendo more into the modern "device-cluster" model similar to what their competition employs (it works for PSN already, never mind the booming smartphone and tablet game market).

This is the biggest reason I have NO Nintendo digital purchases on anything since my Wii. And even then, those are really my ex's. They talked about something like this during the QOL thing, and if they do tie it to an account instead of a console/handheld, I'll probably buy some games. But between pricing and this, no.

Honestly, it just blows my mind how they think RESTRICTING the sale of software would help them in their darkest hour.
Especially in an age where digital distribution is incredibly convenient and easy on every platform BUT Nintendo's.

I honestly don't think Nintendo is very good at business overall. I think they've had some rampant successes and think that this makes them geniuses and they will be able to keep that up. Reality looks at them and laughs. But they've spent three decades setting terms in better times and worse. I think investor dissatisfaction has gotten to a point that maybe they'll actually try to be less...Well, them.

 

[Weaver]

If they would make a Metroid Prime Trilogy HD on PC with mouse support I would buy it at full price.

 

[MetalDooley]

The only other fairly recent American console company other than microsoft was Sega

Sega are a Japanese company not American