Nintendo Praises Independents, Devalues "Garage Developers"

[IndianaJonny]

I can understand Nintendo's concern - bear in mind they owe some of their original dominance in the US to the game crash of '83 and they wouldn't like to see themselves undergo an Atari-esque disaster.

But yes, their business practice regarding 3rd-party games appears paradoxical in light of this (I can only assume they have a tight revenue-stream attitude) and, although household-favourites, their own in-house titles seem to be stangnating.

 

[mjc0961]

Oh, garage developers. I read garbage developers and thought he was going to be talking about Sucker Punch or EA LA. That'll teach me to come straight here when I'm still in the fog of waking up.

But yeah, if he was worried about shovelware, you'd think he'd be sitting down with Ubisoft and their pile of My Coach, Imagine, Petz, and other nonsense and asking them "What the hell is this shit?!"

Maybe he has a point in there somewhere, though. I don't even bother to look at the Indie Marketplace on my 360, because every time I did when it was new, it was all crap. I just rely on site like this to tell me if something worth looking at comes out, otherwise I just do my best to forget it exists so I never have to play anything like that "we're going to turn your controller into a vibrating massager" game ever again.

 

[Scorched_Cascade]

Uh-huh so a day after Nintendo got stomped by Mojang in March Madness they say this? It's either an astounding coincidence or someone at Nintendo saw and went "b'aaaaawaawwwwww".

 

[OblivionRegained]

Who cares what Nintendo say anymore, they have little to no Credibility left. Whats their next big game coming out? Probably Mario id bet, or a game with him featuring in it at some point.

 

[Elvoret]

I just now lost faith in Nintendo. Yeah, sell horrific shovelware if you want, but don't you dare blame other people for flooding the market, especially if they actually, y'know, innovate.

Still, i'm building hopes up that they're going to use all the money they printed for something good...

 

[The Lunatic]

Yes, because everyone should be rehashing the same series after 10 or so years.

 

[sunburst]

The idea that hobbyists are hurting the industry is absolutely absurd. The video game industry was built by garage developers in the first place. Even ignoring that, every artistic medium from sculpture to music to film to literature gets inundated with déclassé works from amateur artists. And that's perfectly okay. The nonprofessional set is just as important to industry advancement as the corporations. You need both Yin & Yang.

 

[McMullen]

Nintendo, Myst was literally a garage-developed game. So is Dwarf Fortress, and as someone mentioned already, Minecraft. All it takes to weed out all the crap is a single skill point in telling good games from bad. But, I guess that is something you've been having trouble with when greenlighting games lately, isn't it?

 

[Tempest13]

This really hurt my opinion of Nintendo as a company. Protip: Actions speak louder than words. At least at $1 cost these games don't feel like a punishment, as opposed to your huge catalog of completely unplayable games.

 

[Someone Depressing]

This is coming from a company that says : "If you try something and it's good, do it over 20 more times over the course of the next 27 years and make it terrible, and it'll still work!"

I don't know how to take Nintendo seriously anymore.

 

[kortin]

Wasn't minecraft originally just a hobby project?

Yes it was, and i would much rather play that than anything Nintendo had made lately

I agree with you there. I've always loved Nintendo's games, but their recent ones just haven't interested me lately. That and my Wii refuses to run any of their new disks.

 

[Desert Tiger]

Somebody doesn't know the definition of an "independant developer", then.

Oh well. We can fuck Super Meat Boy and Minecraft right off then, can't we?

Oh, and Portal and Team Fortress 2 as well, if that's how they want it.

 

[rob_simple]

Nintendo has done far greater damage to the industry than anyone they are attacking, with their Midas-touch gimmick box. I was fine when it was just them doing their own thing, but now they have serious console developers like Sony and Microsoft chasing the casual gaming quick buck with Kinect and Move.

Although it's all conjecture on my part, I seriously worry what will happen to the industry when this particular bubble bursts and all the novelty-gamers walk away and leave these companies staring at the faces of all the jaded gamers who have spent five or ten years watching their favourite passtime get dragged through the mud in the name of making fast cash.

 

[Arehexes]

Oh yeah and Nintendo changes it's policy about what is a game worth the Seal of Quality lately.

 

[Patton662]

Making the same 3 games for the past 20 years doesn't hurt the industry at all does it ?

 

[lacktheknack]

Oh, this is rich. Here, Nintendo, let me show you my sympathy!

<youtube=EzjkBwZtxp4>

 

[Optimystic]

Somewhere close, the Minecraft guy is telling Nintendo to suck it.

(How do you say "suck it" in Swedish?)

 

[beefpelican]

They're just grumpy because Mojang kicked their asses in the march mayhem.

Curse my slow-ass internet connection!

And here I thought I was so clever for thinking of it. Screw you Nintendo!

 

[GuiltBlade]

And thus Nintendo moves onto digging themselves a new hole, apparently the one they were sitting in sprung a leak when they went below the water line.

The reason why their saying it hurts the industry is because its stopping them releasing those few garage game gems themselves at a much higher price.

Go shove a sock in it Nintendo, come back when you've got some new IP to sell that's worth buying.